Bonding Social Capital and Collective Action with Neighbors: Associations with Residents' Perceptions of Their Neighborhoods

Background/Purpose:  Research demonstrates the importance of perceptions of the community on an individual’s physical and mental health.  Bonding social capital, which focuses on the existence of social networks among people within a given community, may be a factor that influences perceptions of the community.  In the field of community development, many academics and practitioners have focused on increasing bonding social capital as a means of facilitating community improvement efforts.  This approach, however, does not distinguish the potential differences of bonding social capital (i.e., the presence of connections among community members) from collective action (i.e., the utilization of those connections with the goal of facilitating change) in neighborhood perceptions.  This study seeks to better elucidate the associations among bonding social capital, collective action, and neighborhood perceptions.

Methods:  This study uses the data from the 2013 American Housing Survey (AHS), a nationally representative, biennial survey collected by the Census Bureau. The dependent variable of neighborhood perceptions is operationalized by respondents’ ten-point rating of their neighborhoods as a place to live (1=worst, 10=best).  Bonding social capital was measured via a commonly used scale of five questions about neighborhood characteristics and neighborly interactions (from 0=low to 15=high).  As an indicator of collective action, respondents answered a dichotomous question (1=yes, 0=no) about whether they had worked with neighbors to address a problem or make an improvement in the neighborhood.  To control for the impact of other social and organization relationships, respondents were asked five dichotomous questions (1=yes, 0=no) about block group membership, civic organization membership, religious organization membership, neighborhood meeting attendance, and whether they spoke with neighbors in the last month.  They were also asked about the number of close friends in the neighborhood (from 1=none to 5=ten or more).  Multiple linear regression was used to test the association between these variables while included a wide range of demographic characteristics (e.g., income, education, race, gender).

Results:  The final model (N=23,985) included both bonding social capital and collective action to predict neighborhood perceptions (R-squared=0.29). Bonding social capital is positively associated with the dependent variable (β=0.39, p<0.001).  Collective action was negatively associated with the dependent variable (β=-0.03, p<0.001).  Except for the number of friends in the neighborhood (β=.03, p<.001) and involvement in a civic organization (β=0.03, p<0.05), all other indicators of social and organizational relationships (i.e., membership in a block group, religious organization membership, attending neighborhood meetings, and speaking with neighbors) were not statistically significantly associated with neighborhood perceptions.

Conclusions and Implications:  The distinction between the existence of social networks and their utilization related to neighborhood perceptions has important practice implications.  It can influence who engages in community development efforts and why, which in turn can impact how decisions are made about neighborhood improvements.  This can extensively influence community well-being.   Additional research is needed to better understand why certain activities, such as attending neighborhood meetings, do not improve perceptions of the community and why others—such as collective action—are negatively associated with perceptions of the community.