Measuring Satisfaction with Student Housing Facilities

Najib Najib

doi:10.3844/ajeassp.2011.52.60

Abstract

Problem statement: In the past decade, resident satisfaction has been used as an important indicator in evaluating student housing quality and services. This study investigates the level of resident satisfaction with student housing facilities. In particular, it examines the level of student satisfaction with living accommodations at one of the leading universities in Malaysia. Approach: The residential satisfaction framework was based on post-occupancy evaluations and has been utilized in previous studies; we expand the framework to address physical and social variables. Face-to-face surveys were conducted with participants who were selected using a cluster sampling technique. Results: The results show a mean satisfaction level of 2.61, which indicates that students are generally satisfied with student housing facilities. This score was lower, however, than the results of previous studies. Conclusion: By assessing residential satisfaction among students, we hope to provide valuable feedback to housing administrators and facility managers of higher learning institutions, thus enabling them to improve their services and offer better housing facilities in the near future.

Highlights

Assessing and quantifying satisfaction with daily life have recently both been topics of vibrant debate
We a dwelling, but we argue that the desire to interact argue that student residential satisfaction is an and socialize with friends or to attain a desired social evaluation of their on-campus living accommodations
The results show that the scale can be considered reliable given our sample, which measured the same residential satisfaction concept

Summary

Introduction

Assessing and quantifying satisfaction with daily life have recently both been topics of vibrant debate. A limited number of studies, have examined residential satisfaction among university students. Few studies explore the physical and social factors that influence residential satisfaction with student housing, for example, Foubert et al (1998) in the United States and Khozaei et al (2010) in Malaysia. In Saudi Arabia, Hassanain (2008) studies the degree of satisfaction in terms of both technical performance (i.e., thermal comfort) and functional performance (i.e., room layout and furniture quality) in sustainable student housing facilities. He uses his findings to develop a model for so-called Post-Occupancy

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