May 15, 2019

10:00pm – 11:00pm

iCal

Center for Health Sciences 33-105 at UCLA Fielding School of Public Health

A joint endeavor presented by the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate’s Housing as Health Care Initiative, the UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge, the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and the UCLA Center for Occupational and Environmental Health

You’re Invited

“The Scourge of the Snout Home? The Link between Car-Oriented Housing Design and Neighboring, Nature Engagement and Happiness”

presented by Deirdre Pfeiffer, PhD, AICP
Associate Professor, Arizona State University
Visiting Scholar, UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate

Thursday, May 16, 2019

12:00 p.m. – 12:50 p.m.

Room 43-105, Center for Health Sciences
UCLA Fielding School of Public Health

Lunch will be provided.

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Relatively little is known about how the design and use of buildings may affect health, including the most important kind of building in the built environment: the home. This research helps to fill this gap by using two surveys from the Phoenix region to explore how the design of the home—whether the home is a car-oriented “snout home” or not—relates to one aspect of health, happiness. I use descriptive statistics and econometric modeling to investigate whether 1) people who live in neighborhoods with higher concentrations of snout homes are unhappier and 2) reduced neighborhood social capital and identification and exposure to nature might account for this dynamic. The findings support these theories while also revealing that people might adapt to (and become happier living in) snout home neighborhoods over time. Overall, this research offers a glimpse into the important role that housing design may play in individual happiness and suggests that revisions to subdivision regulations and retrofitting funds may be warranted to remedy potential happiness-detracting effects of snout home-inundated neighborhoods.

Deirdre A. Pfeiffer, PhD, AICP, Visiting Scholar for the Ziman Center’s UCLA Gilbert Program in Real Estate, Finance and Urban Economics, is an Associate Professor in the School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning at Arizona State University and a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners. Dr. Pfeiffer is a housing planning scholar, with expertise on housing as a cause and effect of growing social inequality and the role of housing planning in meeting the needs of diverse social groups. Her current research explores the interconnections between housing and health, the housing experiences of Millennials and seniors, and the effects of single-family rentals on neighborhoods. She holds an MA and a PhD in Urban Planning from UCLA.

For more information, e-mail Christina Green at christina.green@anderson.ucla.edu.