EVALUATING THE EFFECTIVE FACTORS ON SOCIAL INTERACTIONS ENHANCEMENT IN UNIVERSITY SPACES: A CASE STUDY IN ISLAMIC AZAD UNIVERSITY, ARSANJAN BRANCH

Abstract

Abstract. Besides its primary function as an educational-investigational institution, the university promotes social interactions among people on the grounds that it plays a crucial role in fostering relationships through conversation and meeting. Social interaction involves different aspects of spatial desirability such as privacy, territory, personal space and crowding .In this paper, various definitions of social interaction along with the related key concepts are presented. Using the mixed-method approach, this study first set to evaluate the theoretical framework regarding the social interactions and / in university spaces through library research using available records and documents, and then applied the Field method employing a questionnaire, interviews and observations to explore the students’ social interactions and activity types focusing on their perceptions of the factors that are more likely to promote social interaction on the campus. The sample comprised 200 students randomly selected from different fields and levels in Islamic Azad University, Arsanjan branch (Fars Province). The data collected were analyzed and evaluated using Excel software. The results showed that spaces such as the campus (27 percent) and bus stop (2.2 percent), and activities such as amusement-recreational games (36.2 percent) and campus temporal exhibitions (7.5 percent) are the first and the last selections by the students, respectively.