A Multi-Scale Environmental Behavior Study of the Workers’ New Villages in Lujiazui Subdistrict in Shanghai
Dingyi Zhang
Abstract：This article is an environmental behavior analysis of the Workers’New Village in Shanghai’s Lujiazui subdistrict, across three interrelated scales—city, street, and building, revealing its role as a“living heritage” and the ongoing regeneration
through residents’ everyday practices. At the macroscopic scale, the New Village has undergone a transformation of urban form from the collective order of the work-unit system to a diversified, market-oriented order. At the medium
scale, the neighborhood (“Xiaoqu”) model has fostered closely knit social networks and a strong sense of community identity. At the microscopic scale, residents’ adaptive modifications within limited spaces demonstrate a pronounced degree of spatial agency. This study shows that long-term community interaction and emotional attachment have cultivated a deep place identity, enabling the New Village to retain social warmth and cultural resilience amid fast urban development. By adopting a behavioral perspective, this research contributes to an understanding of the evolution of socialist-era residential spaces and offers practice-based strategic insights for the preservation and regeneration of historic neighborhoods.
