Surveying my bedroom, I see walls scattered with pictures of friends and posters they made, magazines cut outs, photo collages of trips taken and so much more. The decorational pieces do not match, but each item appeals to me in a certain way and is significant. Objects that are part of the different phases in life I have been through, and despite the fact I have moved on to another stage in life, they are all coalesced in a single, undersized bedroom. It might sounds like any other girl's room but it epitomizes me. My life and history. Home is, in Mary Douglas's phrase, "a memory machine" (1993,p.268).To me, a bedroom is an "archive of memories", the original, secret diary, the handkerchief which has been able to dry my tears for almost nineteen years, the camera containing all the films of my life. It reflects who I was in the past and who I am at present.
According to Low and Altman, in the context of "place attachment", place is defined as a "space that has been given a meaning through personal, group, or cultural processes"(1992, p.5). The literature on place attachment emphasizes emotional bonding to environmental settings that are satisfying, and the attachment to places may be based largely on our fulfilling relationship with people in those places. When a strong place attachment develops, Gifford (Gifford, 1987, p.62) suggests that "the meaning of place and the meaning of self begin to merge". A bedroom is where individuals can merge with their private self and thus, it is an important part of their self identity. I am most comfortable in my room because there, I can do whatever I feel like doing, wear whatever I want to wear, watch whatever I want to watch, or listen to whatever I feel like listening to. Basically, my room is my own little world, where I can go to relax, be myself, and do whatever suits my mood. These advantages I am without when I am not in my room.
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"Behaviour setting theories" is about the "relationship between human behaviour and the physical environment" (Hutchinson, 1999, p.
