Human ecology

Human ecology studies relationships between human populations and their social and physical environments, including how people shape and are shaped by those environments.

Ecology: The study of relationships among organisms and between organisms and their environments. Human ecology extends ecology’s relational approach to human populations and social settings.
Chicago School (sociology): A group of sociologists at the University of Chicago who developed influential empirical studies of urban life. Its urban research helped establish ecology as a framework for studying human communities.
Ecological succession: The change in species composition and community structure over time in an ecological area. Urban ecologists adapted succession to describe shifts in land use and community composition.
Urbanization: The growth in the share of a population living in urban areas and the expansion of urban settlements. Urbanization concentrates people and reshapes land, infrastructure, and social relations.
Concentric zone model: A model of urban structure proposing that cities expand outward in rings around a central business district. It is a classic attempt to describe urban spatial patterns using ecological competition and succession.
Human population: A group of people defined by shared geographic, demographic, or social characteristics. Population size and composition shape how people use environments and organize communities.
Robert E. Park: An American sociologist associated with the Chicago School and early urban sociology. Park applied ecological concepts to competition, succession, and organization in cities.
Urban ecology: The study of ecological patterns and processes in urban areas. It examines the concentrated population–environment relationships that human ecology addresses broadly.
Environmental justice: The fair distribution of environmental benefits and burdens and meaningful participation in related decisions. Human ecology helps trace how social position shapes exposure to environmental hazards and resources.
Human ecosystem: A coupled system in which human societies and ecological processes interact. The concept emphasizes reciprocal effects between social systems and biophysical processes.

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