Interior spaces have a great effect on human well-being because of their role as the follower of life. Flexibility becomes an important design issue while considering the subjective character of well-being in interiors. Therefore, not only the inhabitants' needs change during their lifetime, but especially interiors with multiple or changing users need to be considered with a design approach that can lead to multiple solutions that can be adapted to changing users and preferences. This chapter aims to evaluate a series of design approaches that are particularly attentive to a holistic conception of human well-being and that can be adopted with particular reference to interior design. Here it is not intended to identify a general hierarchy of such approaches, as their appropriateness depends on the context, on the user and on the interpretation of the designer himself. Therefore, it is important to know the potentials of different approaches in solving design problems with different priorities.
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Although architectural space can play a significant role on people’s well-being, studies on the relation between space and well-being are very limited. More than the built environment the positive effect of the natural environment has been considered to be very important during the last decades.
Well-being in interiors has started to be discussed recently in many researches, articles and books. On the other hand we can say that all these works can be regarded as initial attempts to understand the relationship between well-being and space. Even the concept of well-being itself is defined in very different ways according to different perspectives.
Well-being can be defined as the positive state of mind and body in relation to the complex system of interconnected components that built up living. In literature conceptions of well-being appears to follow two main traditions which are the approaches following hedonic and eudaimonic traditions. If we look at the concept of well-being from the perspective of the hedonic tradition, design can promote pleasurable experiences and block undesired experiences. So every design object that involves us in desired activities can contribute to our well-being. If well-being is understood as actualizing one’s human potentials so that he can make the appropriate contribution to the society, the role of design can be defined as creating the right tools with which a person can develop himself and find the right ways to perform his actions for his specific contribution. Architecture and spatial design has the potential to make considerable contributions to both hedonic and eudaimonic conceptions of well-being. While the hedonic tradition is concerned with more aesthetic and sensory aspects of space, the eudaimonic tradition necessitate the consideration of functional, social, psychological aspects related to space. So, looking from the perspective of design, the framework of well-being needs to consider all these different dimensions of well-being as the hedonic and eudaimonic views complete each other in terms spatial needs.
Within the field of behavior-influencing design for wellbeing, two approaches currently stand out that explicitly aim to change people’s way of living and to improve wellbeing (Dorrestin & Verbeek, 2013). A first approach is the Persuasive Technology approach, as developed by BJ Fogg (2003). Persuasive technologies aim to guide the behavior of users in desirable directions, and are often concerned with issues in wellbeing, like health, hygiene, and environmental issues. A second contemporary approach to behavior-influencing design for wellbeing was developed by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein. In their book Nudge (Thaler & Sunstein, 2008), the authors make a case for designing our material surroundings in such a way that they influence us in a positive sense, without taking control away from us. The central idea in their approach is that the choices people make are to a considerable extent organized and pre-structured by our material environment (Dorrestin & Verbeek, 2013).
While we consider wellbeing in interiors, the most important contribution can be about structuring an understanding of design that methodologically supports the concept. This can be possible by evaluating the interior design process in a way that the design criteria handles all the issues that are necessary for wellbeing in interiors. Like every design activity, interior design also requires certain design input to be evaluated during the design process. As interior design is concerned with creating spaces that support human activities and well-being, the design input is closely related to the human factor as well as potentials of the existing natural and built environment. Therefore at the beginning of the process the designer needs to define the design criteria including contextual and human related criteria. Then during the design process, he needs to choose a design approach to handle the design criteria with a holistic understanding. As the outcome of the process, interior environments become generators of human wellbeing (Figure 1). In this sense, the issue of wellbeing in interiors needs to be examined especially in terms of design criteria and design process proposing a methodological framework that can help the designer during these two vital steps.