Landscape and Urban Planning 101 (2011) 11–21 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Landscape and Urban Planning journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/landurbplan Affective appraisal of residents and visual elements in the neighborhood: A case study in an established suburban community Heng Zhang ∗ , Shih-Hsien Lin Department of Architecture, National Cheng Kung University, No. 1, University Road, Tainan City 70101, Taiwan article info Article history: Received 1 April 2010 Received in revised form 22 December 2010 Accepted 28 December 2010 Available online 15 February 2011 Keywords: Aesthetic quality Affective appraisal Visual elements Residential environment Community design abstract Urban dwellers perceive and respond affectively to the streetscape they live within everyday. Understand- ing the relationship between the visual elements and the aesthetic response that result from affective appraisal of the neighborhood becomes key to successful planning. This study investigates the underlying factors of community affective appraisal and identifies their predictive visual elements in the neighbor- hood of a Taiwanese suburban community. Consistent with previous findings, factor analysis reveals the two primary dimensions of affective appraisal to be pleasure and arousal. Various attributes of visual elements in the neighborhood, e.g. open space, buildings, community signage, trees, street furniture and pavement are significant predictors of affective appraisal factors. Specifically, the salience of trees and openness of open space may simultaneously induce pleasure and arousal, resulting in a positive emotion of high intensity. These findings shed light on the basis of residents’ affective appraisal of an established community and are instructive in the practice of community design. © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Urban dwellers perceive and respond to the aesthetic qual- ity of the residential environment they live within everyday. The environment may induce positive aesthetic response (Gobster et al., 2007; Nasar, 1994; Ulrich, 1983; Wohlwill, 1974) as a result of the active interaction between humans and the environment around them (Nasar, 1994). Aesthetic response is also one of the essential responses stimulated by the built environment (Nasar, 1983b, 1987). Understanding the relationship between the resi- dential environment and residents’ aesthetic response to it thus becomes a key to successful landscape and urban design (Nasar, 1994). Yet, little is known about the relationship between visual stimuli in the neighborhood and the aesthetic response they trig- ger. There appears to be a gap between the assessment of visual quality perception in the neighborhood and the affective aspects of aesthetic response (Russell and Pratt, 1980). Identifying aesthetic response factors toward the neighborhood and their predictors helps close this gap in community design knowledge. 1.1. Understanding the aesthetic response of residents To ensure a satisfying visual experience for the residents (i.e. the users) and the quality of community design and environment ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +886 6 2757575x54156; fax: +886 6 2909244. E-mail addresses: changlin@mail.ncku.edu.tw (H. Zhang), taiwan2trr@gmail.com (S.-H. Lin). improvement, designers and decision-makers should, in the design process, not just rely on their own expertise (Hanyu, 1997) but also consider residents’ aesthetic response. This way, the disparity between the preference of the designer and the common users, also known as the “user-needs gap” (Thiel, 1994) and a possible cause for design failure, may be mitigated or eliminated. Researches indicate there are possible differences between the responses of residents in an established community and that of participants receiving novel visual stimuli (Nasar, 1983a, 2008). The effect of people’s familiar- ity and long-term interaction with an environment should not be overlooked. A discrepancy in aesthetic response between residents and tourists was found (Wong and Domroes, 2005), demonstrating the uniqueness of residents’ aesthetic response in an established community. As Nasar (1994) reviewed, lack of knowledge in users’ aesthetic response may widen this gap and consequently jeopar- dize a large-scale development project. More scientific research on the relationship between the visual elements and the aesthetic response of residents may help inform community design and plan- ning. With this essential information, designers and planners can avoid making inappropriate “expert” decisions and identify bet- ter alternatives for residents (Sanoff, 2000), a crucial step toward eliminating the expert-user gap and ensuring resident satisfaction of the resulting visual quality. Collecting knowledge on residents’ aesthetic response is fun- damental to the inclusion of residents in the planning of their residential environment. Respect for residents’ points of view can increase resident participation and enhance their involvement in the planning process. Besides contributing to improving the aesthetic quality of the residential environment, residents’ involve- 0169-2046/$ – see front matter © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.landurbplan.2010.12.010