5.1. Life Satisfaction
This study found that those living in downtown high-rises were associated with higher life satisfaction than those from suburban low-rises when controlling for demographic differences; however, this explained less than 5% of the observed variance in life satisfaction outcomes. Still, this was somewhat surprising since suburban living is typically thought to make people feel more satisfied possibly due to larger houses, lower living expenses, better public education resources, greater accessibility to nature, less pollution, etc. This conclusion does not support the long-standing argument that people in dense cities are less satisfied with their lives than suburbs, so the study shows the importance of investigating residents’ life satisfaction at building or neighborhood scales. Social scientists, urban planners, and architects should continue to examine the implications of the characteristics of specific residential buildings and neighborhoods on residents’ life satisfaction, since life satisfaction could be distributed unevenly within a city or county and across its neighborhoods.
The finding that people living in downtown high-rises had statistically higher life satisfaction than those from suburban low-rises may be explained by the results in the third research question, which indicates that accessibility and safety are the strongest predictors of satisfaction with overall residential environment in the research sample. Apparently, a residential lifestyle in downtown Chicago has greater perceived accessibility (i.e., to public transit, grocery stores, museums, restaurants, sporting events, and others) and perhaps higher perceived safety (i.e. because of the presence of security guards, access control systems for buildings, and eyes on the streets [
35]).
5.2. Significant Domains of Satisfaction with Residence
The scores on all five satisfaction domains including travel, accessibility, social interaction, safety and overall residential environment (ORE) reported by residents from both urban and suburban scenarios indicated a high level of satisfaction with residence in both downtown Chicago and Oak Park. Across all satisfaction domains, residents of the downtown high-rises reported higher satisfaction levels, and specifically, accessibility and ORE were found to be the most different between the two settings. As illustrated above, accessibility to public transportation and facilities in downtown Chicago is greater than Oak Park, e.g., multiple modes of transport, especially walking, bicycling and public transportation, greatly support accessibility in the city. Moreover, most city facilities are accessible within a walkable distance in the Chicago Loop and Lakeview neighborhoods where those residential towers are located, as shown in
Table 1, e.g., the “Walk Score” is 94 in Chicago Loop, 95 in Lakeview, and only 73 in Oak Park.
All five satisfaction domains were also found to be highly associated with each other. This suggests that researchers need to consider all these factors as a whole, and study the connections between each domain in order to better serve the planning and design process. Moreover, accessibility and safety were found as the strongest predictors of overall residential environment (ORE) for individuals. This conclusion indicates that social scientists, urban planners, and architects might prioritize the improvement of accessibility and safety in the residential environment in order to achieve a higher overall quality of life for the residents. However, even with these four domains accounted for, only two-thirds (67%) of the variance in overall residential satisfaction could be explained. Thus, future research is needed to examine other factors that contribute to residential satisfaction, such as green space, view, privacy, etc.
5.3. Limitations and Future Research
There were a number of limitations to this study that are important to consider when designing future research. First, this study is cross-sectional in nature and cannot imply causality. Second, the results are likely unique to the Chicago and Oak Park areas, with limited ability to infer similar details in other locations. Third, only limited variables were investigated and controlled for to measure life satisfaction and a sense of community. Demographics such as gender, age, income, and household size were tested in the study, but other variables that might also influence residents’ life satisfaction, such as personality, health constitution, or marriage status, were not considered in the study or controlled for. The research thus shows that residents in the downtown high-rises investigated herein have a higher life satisfaction when controlling for these limited variables, but the results might be very different if more variables are considered and controlled. For example, although household size and years of residence were controlled for, those in the Oak Park setting were more likely to have children, which is an important variable impacting life satisfaction. Furthermore, living longer in the residence may not entirely control for the levels of attachment individuals have toward their residential settings. Future research should incorporate these variables as well. Although random assignment to residence type is not practical or likely ethical, more rigorous research methods such as case control designs and matched data will be useful to further isolate the impact of residence type on life satisfaction.
Additionally, only a limited number of satisfaction domains were examined. Five satisfaction domains including travel, accessibility, social interaction, safety and overall residential environment (ORE) were included in the study. However, these accounted for about two-thirds of the variance in ORE scores in the research sample, indicating more other domains can also contribute to ORE score, such as green space, view, and privacy. It is possible that other domains might be found to be stronger predictors of ORE for individuals, instead of accessibility or safety or that the importance of these domains may differ depending on the characteristics and values of the individual (e.g., socioeconomic status or gender). Also, the five satisfaction domains examined in the study are relatively generic, and future research should break them down into more specific domains such as accessibility to transportation, restaurant, shops, social/culture facilities, sense of community, opportunities for participation in community life, etc. It is also important to note the concept of a neighborhood is multifaceted. Future research is also needed to examine how “neighborhood”, “residence”, and “community” are conceptualized differently between suburban and high rise settings.
As an inner suburb neighborhood, Oak Park is located just approximately 12 km away from the urban center of Chicago (just beyond the boundary of the city), and is supported by access to public transportation, which is not common in the typical American suburb. Moreover, Oak Park has a relatively high population density (4262/km
2 as shown in
Table 1) compared to the typical American suburb (e.g., nearby Naperville, 55 km from Chicago, has a population density of 1554/km
2). Conversely, the downtown Chicago neighborhoods investigated here have a lower population density (i.e., 7200/km
2 in the Loop and 12,000/km
2 in Lakeview) than other comparable cities such as New York City (i.e., 27,799/km
2 in Manhattan). Further research is needed to encompass more neighborhoods across more dense downtown settings and less-dense suburban settings.
Finally, a major limitation of this study is possible sample bias and generalizability. Since individuals in the study were overall quite satisfied with where they live they may have been more inclined to participate in this study and not representative of true population. Therefore, the potential for response bias, given this was not a randomly selected sample, is important to consider when interpreting the findings. Moreover, the majority of the participants were white, wealthy, and highly educated and do not reflect the diversity of the true population. For example, more than 84% of study participants in both scenarios were white, and more than 68% of the households’ annual income in both scenarios was more than USD
$100,000, which is significantly higher than the median household income of the Chicago metropolitan area, which was about USD
$60,000 in 2013 [
36], as shown in
Table 1. On one hand this degree of homogeneity between the two residence types was useful in the attempt to isolate the impact of the residence type on the life satisfaction indicators. However, the sample is clearly not representative of the true population and future research is needed to see if these findings hold true for diverse populations. Future research examining residents’ satisfaction in conjunction with U.S. Census data would be particularly beneficial for ensuring representativeness of the sample. Further, continued examination of how the qualities and features of residential environments in other locations and populations relate to the life and residential satisfaction of inhabitants can help to inform design and policy to improve these important facets of sustainability.