Residential environment and subjective well-being in Beijing: a fine-grained spatial scale analysis using a bivariate response binomial multilevel model

Existing literature has examined the determinants of subjective well-being (SWB) in China from the social, economic and psychological perspectives. Very few studies explore the impacts of residential environment on SWB. Drawing on a large scale questionnaire survey in Beijing, this paper investigates the role of residential environment by decomposing the variations of SWB at fine-grained spatial scales, i.e. district and neighbourhood levels. A bivariate response binomial multilevel model is employed to assess the relative importance of geographical contexts and individual characteristics, in particular, the household registration (hukou) status, in influencing SWB. The results show significant heterogeneities in SWB among districts and neighbourhoods. Neighbourhood types are significantly correlated with SWB, with residents in commercial housing neighbourhoods reporting higher levels of SWB than those in work-unit and affordable housing neighbourhoods. However, the impacts of neighbourhood types are not uniformly experienced by people with different hukou status. Migrants tend to express lower levels of SWB than local residents. Such disparities are more pronounced in urban villages compared with other neighbourhoods.