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Crowding, Privacy, and Coping

Department of Pediatrics, School of Medicine, Mailman Center for Child Development, University of Miami

Paul A. Nelson

Psychological Services Unit at the Veteran's Administration Medical Center

Dale E. Smith

School of Justice at the American University in Washington, D.C.

This study investigated the relationship between living in crowded dormitory conditions and values and expectancies of privacy in 51 entering college freshmen. Aggression, withdrawal, and attitudes toward the environment and toward roommates were assessed. Results indicated that crowded living conditions did affect students' values of privacy but not expectations for obtaining privacy. Locus of control did not mediate responses to high-density living conditions. Crowding was differentially responded to by males and females, with females apparently being less disturbed by the crowded conditions. Females tended to increase values of privacy and spent more time in the more dense rooms while males decreased their values of privacy and withdrew from the situation, spending considerably less time in the higher density dormitory rooms. It is suggested that males and females have different thresholds for feeling crowded and may employ different cognitive and behavioral coping mechanisms for adapting to crowded conditions.

Environment and Behavior, Vol. 13, No. 2, 205-224 (1981)
DOI: 10.1177/0013916581132005


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