Chawla, L., 1992, Childhood place attachments, in: Altman, I. & S.M. Low, ‘Place attachment’, Plenum Press, New York
- Author : Chawla, L.
- Year : 1992
- Published in Book : Place attachment
- Pages : 63-87
- Abstract in English : An essay on Childhood place attachments. The author reviewed literature on childhood’s place attachment and offers a framework of “sources of developing place attachment in early and middle childhood and adolescence. The subject of childhood place attachments has never been directly defined and investigated. It has been indirectly discussed under the terms “affiliation”, “bonding”, “preference”, and sense of place. Borrowed the criteria used to measure social attachments the author offers the following provisional definition: children are attached to a place when they show happiness at being in it and regret or distress at leaving it, and when they value it not only for the satisfaction of physical needs but for its own intrinsic qualities. According to the offered framework, a preschool child will be happily attached to a place where it finds secure, nurturance and where it can explore and at least temporarily appropriate attractive things: a small but dependable, self-affirming, enticing world. The framework shows that healthy place attachments balance the inward hold of an intimate familiar centre with the outward attractions of an expanding world. It also suggest that children’s and adolescents’ success in coordinating these inward and outward pulls depends upon the quality of their social relationship, their sense of identity, and their places. The author describes four forms of childhood place attachment: affection, transcendence, ambivalence, idealization. A table of most frequently used outdoor places is offered too.
- Comments/Notes : place attachment, children, theory, literature overview