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A model of residential satisfaction
Conference Paper · January 1992
Source: OAI
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Maria Amerigo
University of Castilla-La Mancha
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Ms Amérigo Maria .~
Psychologist, Dep. de Psicolog ia Social , Facultad de Psicologia, Universidad Complutense de Madrid,
Campus de Somosaguas, 28023 Madrid, Spain , tel 3943128 , fax 3943189
A MODEL OF RESIDENTIAL SATISFACTION
The consideration of the satisfaction which is provided by an individual's residential
environment, and the main socio-environmental variables which are involved in the interaction
between the individual and his/her residential environment; is a subject which first arose at the
end of the fifties and in the early sixties, with the pioneering works of H.J.Gans and his
coUaborators in the city of Boston (Gans, 1959;Fried and Gleicher, 1961; Hartman, 1963; Ryan,
1963); L.Rainwater in St.Louis (Rainwater, 1966; Yancey, 1971) and M:Young and P.Wilmot in
London (Young and Wilmot, 1957; Wilmot and Young, 1960), to name sorne of the most
significant. These studies, effected in city slum areas, reveal the importance of psycho-social
factors in urban planning programmes.
Since then, numerous empirical studies have been carried out, which, with the aim of guiding
architects and town planners in their decision making, seek to determine those objective and
subjective factors - of a physical or social nature - which explain a greater variation in satisfaction
with the residential environment. Literature on the subject does not reveal many attempts to
provide a theoretical framework for the process which leads an individual to feel satisfaction with
his/her residential environment. Generally speaking, works dealing with this question tackle the
study of residential satisfaction from two different methodological perspectives. Either residential
satisfaction is considered as a variable criterion of quality of life (Marans and Rodgers,' 1975;
Galster and Hesser, 1981; Cutter, 1982; Weidemann et al, 1982); or it is regarded as a predictor
variable of sorne of the following types of individual activity, as shown by authors such as Brown
and Moore (1970) ; Speare (1974) ; Morris, Crull and Winter (1976); Newman and Duncan (1979);
Premius (1986) or Tognoli (1987): 1) Moving to another home or residential mobility; 2)
Modification of the residential environment or adjustment and 3) Modification of aspirations
created by new residentjál necessities or adaptation.
What both perspectives have in common, is the consideration of psychological processes in
the evaluation of the residential environment, which renders residential satisfaction a subject of
relevance to the psychologist, if, as Gifford (1987) affirmed, it is considered to be a consequence
of that evaluation.
Empirical demonstration of such internal processes in the evaluation of the environment has
not always been successful, given the complexity of interrelations between the processes
themselves, although several attempts have been made, such as th6se already mentioned, or
more recently, the model established by Lindberg et al (1987) and Lindberg, Garling and
Montgomery (1988). These authors are not directly concemed with a model of residential
satisfaction, but rather with the question of residential preferences, which, as Holahan (1982)
pointed out, are closely related thereto. These authors establish a model of housing
preferences,according to Ajzen and Fishbein's (1980) theory of reasoned action. The empirical
results they obtain support the hypothesis that the evaluations which people make of a series of
housing attributes are mediated by their structure of essential values and by their beliefs about
the consequences certain behaviour will have on the attainment 01 said values.
An attempt to integrate the two tendencies in the study of residential satisfaction, whilst also
applying Ajzen and Fishbein's actitudinal theory, is the model proposed by Weidemann and
Anderson (1985), which, althou9h not empirically proven, does provide considerable clarification
as regards the determining factors and behavioural consequences of residential satisfaction.
"
411
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417
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