Environmental Disposition of Formerly Homeless Residents in Supportive Housing

Abstract

Homeless in Korea is a representative socially vulnerable class caused by radical industrialization, and supportive housing has been emerged as an alternative solution for them. It is necessary to improve the house planning through understanding residents’ environmental behaviors. The purpose of this study is to identify the environmental disposition of formerly homeless residents living in a supportive housing. The specific environmental disposition characteristics include both territorial behavior, and privacy behavior. The study was conducted by the unobtrusive observation method. Forty seven data were empirically collected from field through a welfare specialist who have long cared and observed the target subjects using a developed measurement tool. As results, the environmental disposition characteristics and its relationships with the residents’ socio-demographic characteristic were identified. There were differences in environmental disposition according to background, economical status, disorder/disease and the space usage, moreover, heterogeneously mixed. Formerly homeless residents are needed to be better understood, and leaded to a more desirable direction in future. The founded territoriality and privacy related environmental disposition behaviors should be considered for the new housing development. This study contributes to the future user-customized planning through better understanding of the vulnerable, who have been unilaterally treated.