From Regeneration to Stewardship: What Shapes Residents’ Willingness to Co-Manage Neighbourhood Micro-Public Spaces in Chongqing, China?
Abstract
1. Introduction
2. Materials and Methods
2.1. Study Setting and Survey Period
2.2. Participants, Eligibility, and Survey Procedure
2.3. Measures
- Organism (appraisals): The organism block comprised perceived value and two TPB-consistent appraisal constructs [21]. Perceived value was operationalised as a second-order construct reflected by functional value (FV; 3 items), emotional value (EV; 3 items), and economic value (CV; 3 items) [35,36]. Participation attitude (PA; 3 items) and perceived behavioural control (PBC; 3 items) captured evaluative and feasibility-related appraisals, respectively [21]. Injunctive norms are treated as shared neighbourhood-level governance signals rather than individual-level normative beliefs, as they index the perceived local enforceability and social endorsement of stewardship tasks, which are features that function as environmental conditions for post-regeneration land management [13].
- Response (stewardship willingness): Stewardship willingness (PW) was assessed using five items [21]. One item was negatively worded and reverse-coded prior to analysis to ensure directional consistency across the scale.
2.4. Data Cleaning and Coding
2.5. Statistical Analysis
- Common method bias assessment: As a precautionary check, Harman’s single-factor test was conducted on the full item pool. The first unrotated factor accounted for 27.3% of the total item variance—well below the conventional 50% threshold—and nine factors with eigenvalues exceeding unity were extracted, suggesting that common method bias is unlikely to represent a dominant confounder [42].
- Within-site clustering: To assess potential non-independence arising from respondent clustering within sites, an alternative specification incorporating cluster-robust standard errors—with site as the clustering unit ()—was estimated. Focal structural paths remained substantively unchanged ( across all paths; see Table S5). It should be noted, however, that clusters falls below the minimum typically recommended for reliable cluster-robust inference (); this correction should therefore be regarded as exploratory. A multilevel SEM approach would require substantially more clusters and is recommended for future research with broader site coverage.
- Demographic controls robustness: The primary structural model specifies theoretically motivated SOR × TPB pathways without demographic covariates. As a robustness check, an alternative specification incorporating gender, age category, education level, homeownership status, and prior participation experience as exogenous controls was estimated. Focal structural paths remained substantively unchanged (; full results in Table S5).
3. Results
3.1. Sample and Data Processing
3.2. Structural Model and Hypothesis Tests
3.3. Sensitivity Evidence for Indirect Pathways
4. Discussion
4.1. Coordination Capacity Is Linked to Stewardship Willingness in a Direct-Dominant Structure
4.2. Interpreting the Direct Path as Routine Governance Rather than a TPB “Failure”
4.3. Implications for Post-Regeneration Tool Design and Stewardship-Capacity Metrics
4.4. Limitations and Future Research
5. Conclusions
Supplementary Materials
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Acknowledgments
Conflicts of Interest
Abbreviations
| MPS | Micro-public space |
| SOR | Stimulus–Organism–Response |
| TPB | Theory of Planned Behaviour |
| SEM | Structural equation modelling |
| CFA | Confirmatory factor analysis |
| WLSMV | Weighted least squares mean- and variance-adjusted estimator |
| HTMT | Heterotrait–monotrait ratio |
| CR | Composite reliability |
| AVE | Average variance extracted |
| BCa | Bias-corrected and accelerated (bootstrap confidence interval) |
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| Variable | Category | n | % |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gender | Male | 237 | 49.7 |
| Female | 240 | 50.3 | |
| Age group (years) | 18–24 | 83 | 17.4 |
| 25–34 | 102 | 21.4 | |
| 35–44 | 95 | 19.9 | |
| 45–54 | 89 | 18.7 | |
| 55–64 | 82 | 17.2 | |
| ≥65 | 26 | 5.5 | |
| Highest education | Primary | 0 | 0.0 |
| Secondary | 121 | 25.4 | |
| College | 159 | 33.3 | |
| Bachelor’s | 173 | 36.3 | |
| Master’s+ | 24 | 5.0 | |
| Occupation | Student | 83 | 17.4 |
| Public sector | 30 | 6.3 | |
| Private sector | 221 | 46.3 | |
| Self-employed | 35 | 7.3 | |
| Retired | 82 | 17.2 | |
| Unemployed | 26 | 5.5 | |
| Monthly income (RMB) | <3000 | 109 | 22.9 |
| 3000–5999 | 91 | 19.1 | |
| 6000–9999 | 143 | 30.0 | |
| 10,000–14,999 | 128 | 26.8 | |
| ≥15,000 | 6 | 1.3 | |
| Residence duration in neighbourhood | <1 yr | 61 | 12.8 |
| 1–3 yr | 70 | 14.7 | |
| 4–6 yr | 73 | 15.3 | |
| 7–10 yr | 126 | 26.4 | |
| >10 yr | 147 | 30.8 | |
| Housing tenure | Owner | 400 | 83.9 |
| Renter | 77 | 16.1 | |
| Local hukou (Chongqing) | Yes | 387 | 81.1 |
| No | 90 | 18.9 | |
| Household type | Single | 94 | 19.7 |
| Couple | 45 | 9.4 | |
| Nuclear w/children | 215 | 45.1 | |
| Multigenerational | 123 | 25.8 | |
| Prior participation experience | Yes | 227 | 47.6 |
| No | 250 | 52.4 |
| Construct | k | M | SD | CR | AVE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stimulus (2nd-order) | 3 | 3.266 | 0.644 | 0.743 | 0.492 |
| Social network (SN) | 3 | 3.242 | 0.902 | 0.830 | 0.619 |
| Social trust (ST) | 3 | 3.226 | 0.930 | 0.840 | 0.637 |
| Injunctive norms (SR) | 3 | 3.331 | 0.926 | 0.867 | 0.684 |
| Value (2nd-order) | 3 | 3.276 | 0.740 | 0.807 | 0.582 |
| Functional value (FV) | 3 | 3.247 | 0.996 | 0.893 | 0.735 |
| Emotional value (EV) | 3 | 3.302 | 0.958 | 0.874 | 0.698 |
| Economic value (CV) | 3 | 3.278 | 0.956 | 0.874 | 0.699 |
| Participation attitude (PA) | 3 | 3.235 | 0.931 | 0.855 | 0.665 |
| Perceived behavioural control (PBC) | 3 | 3.245 | 0.974 | 0.890 | 0.730 |
| Willingness (PW) | 5 | 3.330 | 0.902 | 0.901 | 0.646 |
| Stimulus | Value | PA | PBC | PW | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stimulus | — | 0.776 | 0.551 | 0.570 | 0.576 |
| Value | 0.601 *** | — | 0.535 | 0.575 | 0.541 |
| PA | 0.407 *** | 0.418 *** | — | 0.330 | 0.396 |
| PBC | 0.439 *** | 0.470 *** | 0.257 *** | — | 0.383 |
| PW | 0.457 *** | 0.456 *** | 0.317 *** | 0.321 *** | — |
| (A): Model Fit | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N | chisq | df | cfi | tli | rmsea | srmr |
| 477 | 1312.294 | 370.000 | 0.953 | 0.949 | 0.073 | 0.068 |
| (B): Standardised Structural Paths | ||||||
| Outcome | Predictor | SE | z | p | ||
| Value | Stimulus | 0.790 | 0.104 | 12.338 | 0.000 | |
| PA | Stimulus | 0.606 | 0.078 | 9.818 | 0.000 | |
| PBC | Stimulus | 0.637 | 0.079 | 10.459 | 0.000 | |
| PW | Stimulus | 0.346 | 0.188 | 2.318 | 0.020 | |
| PW | Value | 0.198 | 0.077 | 1.982 | 0.048 | |
| PW | PA | 0.092 | 0.072 | 1.281 | 0.200 | |
| PW | PBC | 0.045 | 0.074 | 0.594 | 0.552 | |
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Li, Y.; Zhou, J.; Hassan, A.S. From Regeneration to Stewardship: What Shapes Residents’ Willingness to Co-Manage Neighbourhood Micro-Public Spaces in Chongqing, China? Land 2026, 15, 667. https://doi.org/10.3390/land15040667
Li Y, Zhou J, Hassan AS. From Regeneration to Stewardship: What Shapes Residents’ Willingness to Co-Manage Neighbourhood Micro-Public Spaces in Chongqing, China? Land. 2026; 15(4):667. https://doi.org/10.3390/land15040667
Chicago/Turabian StyleLi, Yang, Jiasheng Zhou, and Ahmad Sanusi Hassan. 2026. "From Regeneration to Stewardship: What Shapes Residents’ Willingness to Co-Manage Neighbourhood Micro-Public Spaces in Chongqing, China?" Land 15, no. 4: 667. https://doi.org/10.3390/land15040667
APA StyleLi, Y., Zhou, J., & Hassan, A. S. (2026). From Regeneration to Stewardship: What Shapes Residents’ Willingness to Co-Manage Neighbourhood Micro-Public Spaces in Chongqing, China? Land, 15(4), 667. https://doi.org/10.3390/land15040667

