On May 16th,2017, in Room A716 of the New Main Building, Prof. Xinyu Cao of University of Minnesota,was invited to give a lecture entitled “A Methodological Review ofEnvironmental Correlates of Neighborhood Satisfaction”. The lecture was hostedby Prof. Qiong Tian. More than 30 audiences attended, including professors,graduate and undergraduate students from School of Economics and Management,Beihang University.
In this lecture,Prof. Cao introduced a dynamical system involving neighborhood satisfaction orboth public and private sector efforts to retain and attract residents. He classifiesneighborhood satisfaction studies into two categories: ad hoc studies andtheory-driven studies. Although ad hoc studies reveal various correlates ofneighborhood satisfaction, some offer an incomplete and even biasedunderstanding of neighborhood satisfaction because they have little or nosystematic theoretical foundations. By contrast, theory-driven studiesrecognize the mechanisms through which neighborhood characteristics affectneighborhood satisfaction and hence provide more robust findings. Then hereviews studies aiming to shed light on how to improveneighborhood satisfaction of existing residents in planning practice.
And also, Prof. Caoconducted a further discussion with the audiences about the neighborhoodsatisfaction and several recommendations for future research opportunities.
