Green environments and happiness level in housing areas toward a sustainable life

Abstract

Housing environments should enable residents to have positive experiences through the allocation of diverse green environments, which lead to physically and mentally happy, healthy living. Such positive experiences affect their happiness level, thus leading to sustainable lives. However, in Korea, since the 1980s, the design of housing complexes has been overly focused on their economic and iconic value, while the importance of residents' experiences has been ignored in the living environment. This research explores categories of green environments in accordance with their scale and purpose of use and evaluates green environments in housing areas by focusing on the residents' happiness levels. Further, this research examines the correlation between green environments and residents' happiness level and the effect of green environments on their sociality satisfaction level. The results indicate that green environments and happiness levels are critically correlated. Through the results, this research emphasizes the importance of providing structural and strategic planning of green environments in housing areas for residents' happiness, and thus their sustainable lives.