Resident housing satisfaction in multifamily housing environments in Korea

Abstract

Housing environments are important in understanding man's relationship to the built environment, since they represent the most fundamental place for living. Residents' housing satisfaction, as a theoretical construct, has been an important criterion in evaluating the performance of not only the physical, but also social and behavioral aspects of housing environments. This study seeks to (1) expand upon previous causal models of residents' housing satisfaction by examining more explicitly the objective characteristics of the physical environment, in addition to examining the social and behavioral issued related to the design and planning of the housing environment, (2) test a proposed causal model in various multi-family housing environments in Korea, (3) and consider implications of the results of the tested model for design, planning, and policy.

Six large-scale multi-family housing sites in Korea were selected. A modified structured interview form was used as the procedure of data gathering by twelve trained interviewers. As the initial step of causal model testing, both explanatory and confirmatory factor analysis were utilized to develop appropriate conceptual indices, reducing the original items to smaller underlying hypothesized constructs. Based upon the indices, the extended hypothesized model of this study was developed, and tested by path analysis as with ordinary least squares method.

The results from the tested model indicated that, in general, objective environmental attributes and residents' perceptions, beliefs, and affects toward the objective environment were directly and/or indirectly related to residents' housing satisfaction in specific causal paths, supporting Weidermann and Anderson's Model (1985). Safety, satisfaction with visual appearance, and satisfaction with neighbors were found to be important in Korean multi-family housing environment as well as western countries. In addition, the direct causal effects of the issues related to environmental comfort (e.g., dwelling convenience) and prestige were also demonstrated, and (3) consequently, the importance of the objective environmental attributes (e.g., housing environment type, dwelling density, development density) was clear, utilizing the mediating causal effect of appropriate intervening variables.

Implications for future research are discussed, and potential methodological (e.g., interview effects, and sampling and variability) and analytical (e.g., model-reality consistency, comparisons of causal models in different subpopulations, and non-linear relationships between variables) weaknesses are identified. Implications for design, planning, and policy are also discussed. The usefulness of the causal model testing to the environmental design/planning field is clear; a further and more extensive investigation of the relationships between specific design/planning characteristics and residents' affective responses toward their living environment is recommended.