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While placemaking is a multi-disciplinary concern, it is a key focus within the discipline of spatial planning. This paper aims to explore the development of theoretical trends with regard to placemaking in spatial planning since 1975 to identify current emerging theoretical perspectives. Special attention is given to differences in perspectives between the Global North and the Global South.

The study used an integrative literature review (ILR) to analyse placemaking literature over a period of 41 years and five months. The ILR followed the basic review stages: scoping; planning and review protocol; identification/availability; searching; and screening. ILR differs from other reviews as quality appraisal, data gathering, analysis and synthesis rely on coding, thematic content analysis and synthesis.

Initially, the planning/review protocol resulted in 59 contributions on placemaking in various disciplines (excluding publications in other languages that English). Contributions included spatial and design disciplines (29 contributions), social sciences (14 contributions) and other disciplines (16 contributions). The literature review proceeded with a selection of 23 spatial planning contributions (20 from the Global North and three from the Global South). Theoretical trends include placemaking theorised as a physical construct, a social construct, an economic construct (absent in literature from the Global South), a tool for empowerment, a psychological dimension and an environmental management tool.

The most recent theoretical perspectives in literature suggest placemaking as an enabling tool in which people share knowledge and learn new skills to transform their own environment. This empowering process creates a linkage between planning theory and practice.

This paper contributes to the current theories of placemaking in spatial planning. It provides a simplified view of an exhaustive list of existing literature. This paper reports on the current trends and the development of placemaking theory.

The purpose of this article is to examine the effect of housing type, relative to demographics, on householders' self-reported recycling across low-, medium- and high-density housing without recycling facilities by using the theory of planned behaviour.

A survey was conducted amongst 580 households across houses, townhouses and apartments in Pretoria, South Africa. The household member most responsible for recycling completed a self-administered questionnaire. Data were analysed using factor and reliability analyses, decision trees and multivariate analysis of variance.

Age was the strongest predictor; the older the respondent, the more likely the household recycled. Housing type was the second strongest predictor with a significant increase in recycling in houses compared to townhouses and apartments. Subsequent analyses focussed on young respondents to control for age. Housing type had an overall non-significant effect on the factors behind recycling. Post hoc tests, however, suggest that young respondents in townhouses and apartments felt significantly less able to recycle, particularly because of lack of space and support from managing agencies.

For recycling to be acceptable to young people in medium- and high-density housing, interior architects and site planners should find innovative ways to make individual and communal facilities as convenient and accessible as possible to tenants, owners and recycling companies. The role of managing agencies is also critical.

This study is one of the first to systematically examine recycling across three different housing types with recommendations for planning, design and further research.

Meta-synthesis of the research evidence adds value to the process of literature reviewing, providing useful knowledge for researchers, practitioners and policymakers. The aim of the chapter is to explain what meta-synthesis involves and how it illuminates our understanding of concepts. Previous papers on meta-synthesis (by the author) have reviewed research strategies in information behaviour research and methods for meta-synthesis, discussed application of meta-synthesis to research on information behaviour of women, and proposed methods suitable for integrating information literacy research. Meta-synthesis methods have been applied to many areas of social science research. The literature review examines how to reduce the risks involved in suitable for integrating qualitative research or qualitative and quantitative research; outlines the main approaches used in meta-synthesis before explaining the processes used in a meta-synthesis of research on information behaviour of women, reflects on the meta-synthesis methods used, and which might have been used, and shows what meta-synthesis achieves. Meta-synthesis should be used more in information behaviour research, but it is a rigorous process, requiring time and effort to get useful results. On the other hand, meta-synthesis provides more new knowledge, and a deeper understanding of our ideas, than a conventional literature review.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether there is a need to consider gender or sex differences as variables in information behaviour research and, if so, how?

A metasynthesis approach is used. A preliminary framework to categorise information behaviour research on women is developed by integrating main themes from feminist research and information behaviour research. Within each category, studies are compared and contrasted, to identify similar and divergent themes. Themes are then compared across categories, to synthesise the main concepts.

The categorisation works for most studies, apart from a group of studies on health information use, communicating risk and decision making. The meta‐synthesis indicates the importance of concepts such as situation (as mesh), intermediaries (as node with connections), and connecting behaviour. Gender‐related or, rather gender‐ascribed, constructs, such as concern for others, not gender alone are likely to be important variables in information behaviour.

The meta‐synthesis is a top‐level synthesis, as the number of studies prohibited a more detailed approach. Further meta‐synthesis of a few high quality research studies would help to confirm the findings.

The synthesis illuminates a different perspective on information behaviour: the network of information users rather than the individual information seeker.

The synthesis integrates some feminist research themes with information behaviour research, and the findings have implications for general information behaviour research.