Application of an ergonomic method in the analysis of environmental perception in urban public spaces

• Grant number: 17/21198-4
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Effective date (Start): December 01, 2017
• Effective date (End): November 30, 2018
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Architecture and Town Planning - Fundamentals of Architecture and Urbanism
• Principal Investigator: Silvana Aparecida Alves
• Grantee: Laura Carolina Santos
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Arquitetura, Artes e Comunicação (FAAC). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Bauru. Bauru , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The environmental perception is constituted as a research line of evaluation of the built environment and the relation between this and the human behavior. Thus, it presents a conceptual approach to the qualitative evaluation of Architecture. In this context, this research is based on the analysis of the environmental perception of the users of a square located in the central area of the city of Bauru (SP). The research's aim is to verify the relation between architectural, ergonomic and environmental characteristics and the usability ways of the square, as well as the preference relations for certain spaces, according to the age group, and to analyze if the usability way and appropriation is influenced by this variable. The method used to achieve the objectives is the DePAN (Design for Permanence and Attractiveness in Niches of Living spaces), developed by Alves (2012). It is a method formed by graphical meshes, dimensioned according to concepts of environmental perception and ergonomics / anthropometry, and that allows to graphically represent the space's attributes and associates them with the presence of people, ways of use, appropriation of space and interaction among individuals. The Interview method is also used to obtain information about the cognitivity of the space users. Despite the independence of these tools, in this research they complement each other, to present a set of information about the studied and related variables. (AU)