Source: Cliparthut.com/used by permission A Man’s Home Is His Hassle – P.J. Laux Soon, I will be taking a trip back to the anthracite coal region of Northeastern Pennsylvania where I grew up. This is a place that has been vilified as the worst region of Pennsylvania to live in and the least happy place in America . Be that as it may, it is still the place I identify as "Home" even though I have not lived there for over 40 years. Planning this trip got me to thinking about the nature of “home” and how slippery the concept actually is. It is no secret that individuals develop very strong emotional attachments to the places that they live. These affectionate bonds between people and places go by a variety of names, including “ Topophilia ,” “ Rootedness ,” and “ Attachment to Place .” A strong attachment to the place that you live results in greater satisfaction with your home and expectations of future stability in that place. These feelings transcend attachments to other people in the area and represent a genuine affection for the physical location itself, and the passage of time strengthens our attachment to the places that we live. Because our physical surroundings play such an important role in creating a sense of meaning and organization in our lives, it is not surprising that our sense of the place we live is closely tied to our sense of who we are. In the " Wizard of Oz ," Dorothy doesn't achieve closure until she recognizes that " There is no place like home ." Thus, the word “ home ” connotes more than just a house. But how exactly do we determine where “home” is? In a previous blog , I explored how deceptively complicated it is to ask someone “where they are from.” In 2008, The Pew Research Center conducted a survey of 2,260 American adults. Among other things, they asked participants to identify “the place in your heart you consider to be home.” Thirty-eight percent of the respondents did not identify the place that they were currently living to be “home.” Twenty-six percent reported that “home” was where they were born or raised; only 22% said that it was where they lived now. Eighteen percent identified home as the place that they had lived the longest, and 15% felt that it was where their family had come from. Four percent said that home was where they had gone to high school. “Home” is the place where you feel in control and properly oriented in space and time; it is a predictable and Frank T. McAndrew Ph.D. Out of the Ooze "Home" means so much more than just a house, so how do we decide where home is? Posted Aug 03, 2015 Home Is Where the Heart Is, but Where Is "Home"? 69 Like Like