Book excerpt: Essay from the year 2012 in the subject Sociology - Basics and General, grade: 4.0, University of Ghana, Legon, course: Archaeology and the Natural Environment, language: English, abstract: The natural environment is the phenomenon of all natural things that encompasses humanity. This means that the natural environment entails all living and non-living things which occur naturally on earth without the influence of human beings. The natural environment includes the Physical environment and the Biological environment. The physical environment entails all physical features occurring naturally on earth. It includes the atmosphere (layer of gases surrounding the earth), hydrosphere (liquid component of the earth) and lithosphere (solid layer covering the earth). The biological environment includes the natural biological factors as in animals, plants and bacteria that affect human life in a particular place or period. According to Wikipedia, human behaviour on the other hand refers to the range of actions or attitudes exhibited by humans. This means that every action, speech, gestures and mannerisms employed by humans consist of our human behavior. Human behaviour is influenced by our culture, emotions and the natural environment. As the culture of a particular society influences the conduct or behaviour of an individual, so does the natural environment also influences human behaviour. It does influence the human behaviour because even the water, climate, soil, animals and plants we interact with do affect our attitude towards life and at times influence our cultural traits. The natural environment has influenced human behavior from the beginning of humankind up till the present. It has influenced us in our behaviour towards our food, shelter, clothing, vocabulary acquisition and ideology.