Life Space Regions

The concept of life space is usually divided into two parts: person and environment.
These two parts can be differentiated further into regions. A region is
any major part of the life space that can be distinguished from other parts
and is separated by more or less permeable boundaries. For example, regions
differentiated within the person might consist of needs, goals, hopes, and aspirations
of the individual, whereas the differentiation of the environment
might consist of profession, family, friendships, social norms, and taboos.
Locomotion, or behavior and change in the life space, is determined by
the differentiation of regions in the life space and by the forces for change
emanating from each region. Often, in any given life space, there are opposing
or conflicting forces. For example, a boss may want to increase productivity as much as possible, whereas coworkers may seek to limit production to
levels obtainable by all workers. According to Lewin, these tensions, or opposing
social forces, provide the motivation for behavior and change in the
life space. Tension can be resolved by any number of activities, including
reconfiguring the life space either physically (for example, getting a new
job) or mentally (for example, devaluing either the boss’s or coworkers’
opinions); performing a substitute task that symbolically reduces tension
(for example, performing different tasks of value to the boss); or finding the
“quasi-stationary equilibrium,” or position where all opposing forces are
equal in strength (for example, performing at a level between boss’s and coworkers’
recommendations).