Impact of housing design factors on children's conduct at school: An empirical study of Hong Kong

Abstract

This paper looks at how housing and design attributes may affect the conduct of schoolchildren in one of the world's most densely populated cities, Hong Kong. By carrying out an empirical study with a sample of 633 students, we found that the influence of housing type and tenure is not as strong in this city as in other places. For example, children from private and public housing communities do not show markedly different behaviour at school. Moreover, we found that the size of the housing unit does not matter as long as the schoolchildren have some place of their own at home where they can claim a high degree of privacy. This may compensate for the lack of space in most Asian cities, which are compact and densely developed. We also found that, contrary to Asian family values, big families are not conducive to fostering well behaved kids. All of these findings have important implications for government policy in terms of the design and management of public housing communities as well as the development of senior housing estates, among other issues. © 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.