Urban Sociology
Amir Ebrahimi Hasanakloo; بنیادی Bonyadi; Atoosa Modiri
Abstract
Highlights- This research seeks to investigate the factors affecting the levels of residents’ place attachment.- The results demonstrate that place attachment consists of four dimensions: spatial identity, spatial affect, spatial dependence, and spatial social bonding.- Of all these four dimensions, ...
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Highlights- This research seeks to investigate the factors affecting the levels of residents’ place attachment.- The results demonstrate that place attachment consists of four dimensions: spatial identity, spatial affect, spatial dependence, and spatial social bonding.- Of all these four dimensions, spatial social bonding was identified as the most powerful predictor of place attachment.- The method of validation factor analysis validated the place attachment structure as a quadratic component consisting of four dimensions. IntroductionMany urban planners and designers have considered the topic of the quality of the emotional relationship between man and their place of residence, or place attachment, in recent years. In the past, the relationships between neighborhood residents who knew each other and were aware of each other’s circumstances contributed to healthy, familiar emotional relationships among them. In other words, neighborhoods, being familiar social units, involved profound cultural roots, pursued certain traditions and customs, and even continued the rites and ways of life and the norms and customs inherited from the past. In modern cities, however, kinship, shared religious beliefs, and moral values give way to anonymity and individualism as the emotional bonds of the local community weaken. Over time, neighborhood connections have lost some of their function. Lack of familiarity with people in the neighborhoods, lack of joint activities, and lack of ethnic, linguistic, religious, and cultural ties as firm as before have reduced people’s levels of emotional connection, i.e. their senses of place attachment with their residential neighborhoods. Therefore, this article aimed to provide structural modeling to investigate the aspects effective on attachment to residential areas.Theoretical FrameworkIn recent years, many researchers have examined the aspects of place attachment through structural equation modeling, providing a framework for their classification. Understanding the dimensions of place attachment through structural equation modeling allows researchers to better explore the potentials of this concept and its complexity, which makes up the objective of this study along with identification of the dimensions. The construct of spatial attachment consists of spatial identity, spatial dependence, spatial social bonding, and spatial emotion.MethodologyThe development of a valid, trustworthy method to measure and evaluate the dimensions of place attachment has been the focus of numerous studies in recent years, with quantity-oriented academics highlighting the multidimensionality of the construct. However, no one, simple scale of measuring is agreed upon by academics and researchers in the field due to the diversity of the methodologies used in the operationalization of the idea and the levels of relevant multi-dimensionality. Because of this significance, this research sought to investigate the dimensions affecting the level of residents’ place attachment. Since this was not easily possible, the indexing technique was used for examination. In this technique, indicators were considered to identify the dimensions, and questions were asked in the questionnaire to measure them. For assessment of the respondents’ opinions about the research topic, their responses were measured with a 5-point Likert scale. Moreover, a simple random sampling method was used to select the sample in the Haft Chenar neighborhood. The sample size was 687, and data analysis was made using the SPSS software version 22. For this purpose, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling were used. Results and DiscussionThe findings demonstrated that the level of attachment of the Haft Chenar neighborhood residents is high. On the other hand, the results of the analysis of the structural model of the research supported the hypothesis that place attachment is a quadratic component consisting of the four identified dimensions of spatial identity, spatial affect, spatial dependence, and social connection with the place. It is noteworthy that among all these four dimensions, social connection with the place was identified as the most powerful predictor of place attachment in the research, indicating that the level of social connection in a neighborhood is high, which can directly increase the level of residents’ attachment to the place. Meanwhile, spatial identity received the lowest score for the Haft Chenar neighborhood. Therefore, it seems that residents’ identity to place can be expected to increase due to the experiences formed in the context given that this factor has won the lowest score among the residents, who can realize this by planning and designing an active node and center in the context of these residential neighborhoods and by creating attractive, pleasant places for socializing and embedding community places in the long run. Moreover, a number of solutions were provided for urban planners and designers to increase attachment in the Haft Chenar neighborhood given that these four dimensions of convergent narrative for the structure indicated spatial attachment.ConclusionThe spatial attachment model was experimentally tested given spatial attachment as a secondary component and the claim of this research that spatial dependence, spatial identity, spatial affection, and social connection with place constitute different primary dimensions of place attachment. Hence, the validation factor analysis method confirmed the validity of the spatial attachment structure as a quadratic component consisting of four dimensions. As demonstrated by the fitness indices of the model, it is suitable for research data. AcknowledgmentThis article is taken from Amir Ebrahimi Hasanakloo's Master's thesis entitled "Investigation and evaluation of factors affecting the increase of residents' attachment to residential neighborhoods (with an approach to Haft Chenar neighborhood - District 10 of Tehran)" which was supervised by Dr. Naser Bonyadi and Dr. Atoosa Modiri in the urban planning department of the Islamic Azad University of Central Tehran branch.
Urban Planning
Reza Ramyar; Esmaiel Zarghami
Volume 6, Issue 23 , August 2017, , Pages 39-52
Abstract
Objectives:
Residential and neighborhood open spaces are more than a simple space. They are the most important places for people living in urban areas and are part of their sense of living. The literature of neighborhood environments has always been attempting to describe neighborhoods in terms of the ...
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Objectives:
Residential and neighborhood open spaces are more than a simple space. They are the most important places for people living in urban areas and are part of their sense of living. The literature of neighborhood environments has always been attempting to describe neighborhoods in terms of the criteria of their overall quality. Social and individual attachment are two major factors having an important effect on the overall quality of residents’ lives. Psychological and sociological aspects of people’s behavior in these spaces are addressed in the disciplines of environmental psychology and sociology. These two knowledge areas have evolved with development of new methods and knowledge improvements. In these two disciplines, different and almost independent, sometimes contradicting, theories have been proposed to in a complementary way. Finding a relationship between the proposed theories in these two fields is rarely considered. Investigating one of the most important concepts in environmental psychology, i.e. place attachment, and using this concept to improve social life of residential neighborhoods, this paper tries to establish a link between these separate disciplines. Most studies conducted on place attachment and meaning of place have been at the individual level addressing mostly individual emotions and experiences. Also, in the social domain, only social emotions and experiences have been discussed. Focusing on social participation and place attachment, this research first tries to show the complexity and multi-dimensionality of these concepts and then attempts to from a framework for social planning in common areas like residential open spaces.
Research method:
Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), as a vigorous regressive multivariate analysis technique, is used to examine the hypotheses in this research. SEM is a multivariate statistical analysis technique suitable for analyzing structural relationships. Its ability to define relationships between unobserved constructs (latent variables) and observable variables has made it a common justified method in social sciences. In the modeling method here, we use SEM that allows complex relationships between one or more independent variables and one or more dependent variables.
Findings:
Based on the findings, place attachment and participation have a significant impact on social capital. The direct correlation between participation and social capital is stronger than that of place attachment, showing higher significance of participation in affecting social capital. Participation has also a great impact on place attachment.
Results:
Place attachment is a complex process that significantly affects social factors. It spreads and gets shaped over time. It is not only the place, but also social relationships produced in that place that support the maintenance and development of local community relations. Places are formed by individuals, groups and neighborhoods, and neighborhood groups are shaped by their place. According to this research, certain places with a strong sense of identity, higher communication, social capital and collective actions such as participation create a higher sense of attachment in the residents.
