Impact Research in Architecture and Urbanism

The interdisciplinary DFG network “Impact Research in Architecture and Urbanism” meets regularly at various locations to develop and test methodological approaches; in collaboration with the Liste Meitner Group “Coded Objects” it develops experimental methods for studying the objects that make up our environments. The conception of architectural and urban planning as well as public open spaces such as parks and squares is usually associated with ideas regarding the societal, social, cultural, political and identity-related effects to be achieved. So far, however, there has been no specification of the actual fields of impact and the research methods and theories that can be used to study them. The network "Impact Research in Architecture and Urbanism: Interdisciplinary Theories and Methods" responds to this lack of definition concerning the concepts of impact at work in the built environment and brings together scattered knowledge across disciplines. It focuses on specific fields of impact: On conscious and unconscious perceptions by individuals, on individual or collective patterns of behaviour and use, and on the effects that architecture has in spheres such as the economy, politics and culture.