Spatial Patterns in Suburban Evaluations

Studies of various types have indicated that residential areas of a city differ in their characteristics, and have suggested that these differences are the bases of residents' choices of where to obtain a home. Although people have been asked why they have made a certain choice, however, no attempts have been made to investigate the number of dimensions to residents' evaluations of suburbs, or the number of criteria on which they rate areas. The present study suggests that there might be five such dimensions, these being amalgams of a large number of terms which could be used to describe an area. The semantic differential technique has been used to test whether these five are relevant to a selection of residents of Christchurch, New Zealand; the analyses suggest that in fact there are probably three interrelated dimensions, and that these three are invariant with area of residence in the city. Although these dimensions of the criteria for evaluation are the same, however, the various suburbs were rated at different levels by groups living in different areas. Apparently both the social and the spatial distance between the respondent's home suburb and that which he is rating are influences on these variations.