Cognitive Images of Hong Kong Youth: A Study of Chinese Urban Perception
Date
1976-08
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[Honolulu] : [University of Hawaii at Manoa], [August 1976]
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Abstract
The purpose of this study was to describe and analyze the perception of the urban environment of young adults in Hong Kong. A secondary purpose was to refine methodologies for gathering environmental perception data relating to a large and complex urban area from a sizable sample of low-income individuals in a non-Western culture.
Data for the study were obtained by participant observation and both informal and formal interviews. Information from eighty-eight young laborers and factory workers living in the Ngau Tau Kok District of Kowloon was compared with data from eight hundred and forty-two students attending schools in Kowloon, Hong Kong Island, and the New Territories.
Respondents were asked to indicate on a five point scale their perceived familiarity with each of sixty-nine districts covering the entire urbanized area. Other questionnaires asked the respondents to scale the average monthly household income and the population density of each of the same sixty-nine urban districts. The ability to scale perceptions had been tested beforehand by means of a questionnaire administered to seventy-four workers to ascertain objectively their actual knowledge of the sixty-nine districts. The averaged responses of youths of different ages at each school were mapped and compared using Two Way Analysis of Variance. Comparisons between schools were made by visually comparing the maps of averaged perceptions and by using Spearman's Rank Correlation. In an attempt to examine the accuracy of subjective perceptions of income and population density, these measures were compared with detailed data on household income and population density obtained from the 1971 census.
Conclusions drawn from the surveys indicate that Hong Kong youth are most familiar with places near their residences and major shopping and entertainment districts. Without exception they were most familiar with the urban area on the side of the harbor where they reside; the harbor barrier appears to clearly define people's activity spaces and this is reflected in familiarity with the urban area. In addition, familiarity clearly increases with age but the greatest differences between individuals' familiarity with urban districts in Hong Kong relates not to age or sex but rather to place of residence and socioeconomic background. Just as Hong Kong is divided by the harbor into two cities, so also it is divided into two separate cognitive cities by the sharp distinction of familiarity and activity spaces of the rich and the poor. An understanding of the perceived familiarity of different urban dwellers is essential for effective social planning in Hong Kong and the cities of the Developing World.
Description
PhD University of Hawaii at Manoa 1976
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 202–212).
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 202–212).
Keywords
Hong Kong youth, China, Hong Kong, urban sociology, cognition, Hong Kong cities and towns, young adult attitudes
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xvi, 212 leaves : illustrations, maps
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Theses for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (University of Hawaii at Manoa). Geography.
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