Housing Type, Stress, and Family Relations

Abstract

Social and psychological pathologies have been frequently associated with features of the built environment, being most prominently linked to apartment dwellings and high-rise housing, a growing part of the urban landscape. Pathology is seen as being related to housing type by way of the constraints various buildings impose. Selective support for this hypothesis is found, based on data obtained from a sample of 560 families. The most pronounced effects of multi-family housing, we find, bear more on husbands and fathers than on other family members. It is noted, however, that adverse housing effects tend to be mild, contrary to the predictions of urban critics and the more dire consequences foreseen by some urbanologists. The potential importance of the effects housing may have is highlighted by the global dimensions of current population growth. Within only the next two decades, this growth will necessitate an increase in housing stock to accommodate an additional 1.8 billion people. In the U.S. alone, approximately 24 to 42 million additional persons will require housing. The capital outlays and amount of land use implied by such population growth suggests a future departure from the realization of a single-family home, the predominant housing preference at least in North America. Accordingly, apartments and other forms of multiple-family dwellings are likely to become a major feature of our modern urban landscape. If housing types have a differential impact on their inhabitants, this development may be a cause for general societal concern. Indeed, some studies already have indicated significant adverse