Crowding and Children’s Mental Health: the Role of House Type

An important and largely unstudied aspect of the apparent relation between residential crowding and mental health is the potential role of environmental design to moderate this relation. An epidemiological investigation reveals that the type of housing children inhabit alters mental health correlates of residential crowding. Third and fourth grade Austrian children (n=1,236) from small towns and agricultural areas who reside in multiple family dwellings manifest signi¢cantly stronger associations between residential density and a standardized self-report index of psychological health (KINDL) as well as teacher ratings of behavioral conduct in the classroom (Needleman) in comparison to their counterparts residing either in single family detached homes or in row houses. These ¢ndings occur independently of mother’s educational level among children residing in relatively low-density housing. # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Most research on crowding and mental health has attempted to uncover direct relations between household density and various indices of psychological well being. Generally, there is good support for the claim that higher levels of interior residential density (people per room) are associated with elevated levels of psychological distress among adults (Marsella et al., 1970; Hassen, 1977; Gove & Hughes, 1983; Gabe & Williams, 1987; Jain, 1987; Evans et al., 1989; Edwards et al., 1990; Lepore et al., 1991). The Lepore et al. (1991) study is especially noteworthy because it provides he only prospective, longitudinal evidence for the linkage between crowding and mental health. At initial occupancy, residents of more crowded homes did not di¡er from their less crowded counterparts in psychological distress. However, at two months occupancy there was such a relationship, and by eight months the strength of the association had grown stronger. This pattern of results argues against a social drift or downwards mobility explanation for the crowdingFmental health association. Residential crowding appears to lead to psychological distress and not the other way around. Although there is less evidence for the mental health sequelae of residential crowding among children, indirect data exist. Children in higher density homes experience greater corporal punishment (Booth & Edwards, 1976), higher levels of con£ict with family members (Booth & Edwards, 1976; Saegert, 1982; Evans et al., 1998) and reduced parental responsiveness (Bradley & Caldwell, 1984; Wachs, 1989; Evans et al., 1999). Given these impairments in critical parent^child proximal processes (Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 1998), it is not surprising that children from higher density homes manifest more behavioral adjustment di⁄culties at school (Booth & Johnson, 1975; Saegert, 1982; Evans et al., 1998). An important and largely unstudied aspect of the apparent relation between household crowding and psychological distress is the potential role of environmental design to moderate this association (Aiello & Baum, 1979; Ineichen, 1993). What role might interior design or architectural variables play in altering the nature of the relations between household crowding and mental health? This study examines whether typical variations in housing type, speci¢cally single family, row house, or multiple unit dwellings, make any di¡erence in how children respond to residential crowding. There is some indirect evidence in the crowding literature to expect that the latter housing type, multiple family 222 G.W. Evans et al. dwellings, might exacerbate negative impacts of residential crowding on children’s psychological well being. One of the major underlying psychological processes that appears to account for some of the negative e¡ects of crowding is loss of control over interpersonal interaction (Altman, 1975; Saegert, 1982). Too much unwanted social interaction is a frequent concommitent of crowding (Baum & Valins, 1977, 1979; Mc Carthy & Saegert, 1979). When interior spaces are designed to foster better regulation of interpersonal contact, residential density seems to have less negative impact. Baum and colleagues in a series of studies have shown that long corridor dormitory designs in comparison to either suites or short corridor designs caused elevated crowding and greater problems with the regulation of social interaction (Baum & Valins, 1977, 1979). Follow-up research revealed that when longer corridor dormitories were redesigned so that the number of residents sharing a common corridor was reduced, the negative crowding e¡ects were attenuated (Baum & Davis, 1980). It is important to note that the students in Baum’s studies did not choose their housing accomodations. Cox et al. (1982) and Schae¡er et al. (1988) found that redesigning prison sleeping areas to enable better regulation of social interaction reduced crowding, improved physical health, and lowered both psychophysiological and self-reported stress. Floorplan con¢gurations that a¡ord greater opportunity for being alone also attenuate the negative impacts of residential density on psychological well being. Evans et al. (1996) used spatial syntax analysis to quantify residential £oorplans among o¡ campus student housing units. Floorplans with greater depth bu¡ered the crowding^distress relationship. Depth is a measure of the degree of separation between di¡erent spaces within a £oorplan con¢guration and predicts social interaction (Hillier & Hanson, 1984). Residential design can also make a di¡erence in how children respond to crowding. Wachs and Gruen (1982) found that preschool children in more crowded homes manifested delayed cognitive development. Both cross-sectional and longitudinal evidence re£ected this trend. Interestingly if these children had access to a room where they could spend time alone, the negative developmental correlates of residential crowding were diminished. There is also evidence that when children live in larger, multiple family dwelling complexes, emotional well being may be a¡ected. Children living in high-rise, multiple dwelling complexes have higher rates of behavioral problems in comparison to those residing in single-family homes or smaller, low-rise buildings (Ineichen & Hooper, 1974; Richman, 1977; Saegert, 1982). Rates of juvenile delinquency are also higher among adolescents in multiple dwelling units relative to those in single-family detached homes (Gillis, 1974). Of particular relevance to the present study, the major hypothesis o¡erred to account for the apparent covariation between housing type and children’s psychological distress is the relative inaccessibility to playspaces external to the residence. This in turn is believed to lead to young children being cooped up inside with more intra-family con£ict and greater social isolation from peers (Halpern, 1995; Evans et al., in press; Gi¡ord, in press). In the present study, we were able to take advantage of an epidemiological study on environmental quality and children’s well being conducted in small towns and rural areas in the Northern Tirol Region of Austria, proximate to Innsbruck. Included in the study protocol were measures of residential density (people per room), housing type (single-family, row house, multiple dwelling unit) and two indices of mental health. Based upon prior research on crowding and architecture as well as on housing, we hypothesized that elementary school children living in high-density homes in multiple dwelling complexes would su¡er greater psychological distress than those living in crowded homes that were either single-family detached or row houses. Thus, we predicted an interaction between density and house type on mental health. Another facet of this study warrants brief comment. Unlike previous psychological studies of crowding, the data set is large, consisting of nearly 1300 children. This also enabled us to generate a dose^response function, examining variability in mental health over a range of residential densities typical for this region of Austria and probably for much of non-urban, Western European. To our knowledge, no dose^response data currently exist on residential density and mental health.