A Study of Sociability Factors’ Influence on Educational Spaces: The Case of the School of Art and Architecture of Bu-Ali Sina University

Sociability of educational spaces is crucial to the quality of education because a major part of learning takes place through attending public spaces, acting in spaces, social interaction with peers, and collective life in public spaces. Sociability provides for the users’ social needs. The present study seeks to explore the development of sociability in educational spaces through increasing opportunities for social interaction in educational buildings, particularly in their shared spaces. The hypothesis is that human, activity and environmental factors stand in a significant relationship with sociability of the students at the School of Art and Architecture, Bu-Ali Sina University of Hamedan, Iran. Underlying this study is a descriptive-analytical methodology that was applied, in form of a case study, in the School of Art and Architecture of Bu-Ali Sina University. The data were collected by using library research, interview, field observation, and case study. In so doing, a survey was performed by administering a questionnaire to the subjects, i.e. sample students from among the entire population of the students at the school. The correlation of the data was then analyzed by SPSS software and influence of each variable, on the development of sociability in educational spaces, was determined. According to the findings, from among the three variables, the psychosocial characteristics of the users, which tend to be the most influential and physical features of the public environment, are the least influential factors. Also the results of correlation tests show that psychosocial factors and physical factors are directly correlated with activity-related factors.