Environment and mental health

Environments seen as the physical, chemical, and biological conditions to which organisms are subjected, define the ways we obtain various resources, their quantity and their quality. In interplay with our organisms, environments determine how 'fit' we are. An aspect of that fitness is the quality of mental functioning. Although there is a traditional view that there is something like an 'objective environment' and an 'effective environment', a part of the objective environment that actually affects the organism, the dividing line between the two is rather obscure. Environment in general cannot be defined without taking into account the behaviour of the organism, and it is especially challenging to define what environment means to humans, given the enormous variation and scope of human behaviours; what it is that we require and tolerate. Simultaneously, that physical environment is the broader context of what we usually term 'social environment'. This paper outlines the conceptual problems in determining and evaluating the relationship between environmental conditions and more proximal determinants of mental health, at the same time reviewing the assumptions of some of the well-known examples of that relationship.