Lifestyle research also revealed that situational and socio-cultural components are related to the differentiation of lifestyles in urban systems.
2.2.2.1 Situational submatrix
The situational submatrix consists of the lifestyle setting that is cognitively linked to the socio-cultural and human matrix. Incentives, stability of social production, culturally preshaped models of the situation, and processing of information influence the logic of action (Esser, 1996). Accordingly, lifestyle settings provide incentive-barrier structures for self- realization that facilitate or inhibit sustainable urban living.
Consumer behavior: The choice and willingness to consume are oftentimes restricted
by situational constraints such as working conditions, social norms, urban structure, legal and organisational changes, availability of products, or price differences (e.g., Hertwich, 2005; Sanne, 2002). Media coverage is also linked in forming the identity of corporate networks and entrepreneurial urban consumer lifestyles (Greenberg, 2000). Sustainable shopping carts, educational programs, and simulation games were developed that induced changes in attitudes and increased consumer awareness. Removing external barriers and motivating urban consumers are thus prerequsites for facilitating sustainable consumption.
For sustainable waste management, decision-makers can provide flexible and innovative frameworks (Lang et al., 2006). Local waste support systems need extrinsic motivators of an economic, informational, administrative, and physical nature (Lindén and Carlsson-Kanyama, 2003). Waste pricing and informational campaigns on recycling benefits, as well as littering laws and garbage container siting were also discussed.
Public health: The technological modernization of urban systems worldwide has
shifted physical activity, dietary structure, energy expenditure, car use, occupation, household work, and health throughout the life-cycle (Galea and Vlahov, 2005; Popkin, Duffey, and Gordon-Larsen, 2005). Although urban areas generally have a more sophisticated basic infrastructure than rural areas, they are not always sufficient for sustaining healthy lifestyles, especially in developing countries (UN-Habitat, 2007). Many disadvantaged urban areas show inadequate social infrastructure and land-use or a mismatch of neighborhood and lifestyle conditions (Gordon-Larsen et al., 2006; Villard, Ryden and Stahle, 2007). The proximity, availability and quality of health care arrays, community trails, sports complexes, and social resources, as well as their accessibility and segregation, affect health lifestyles (e.g., Galea and Vlahov, 2005). Investing into neighborhood access, social services, nature, community trails, and medical specialists could thus mitigate social disparity in access to health care facilities.
Although food options have increased worldwide, there is still a differential supply of diversified, healthy and processed foods from which rich urbanites profit most (Popkin, Duffey and Gordon-Larsen, 2005; Ruel, Haddad and Garrett, 1999). This is especially true for urban and rural systems of developed and emerging countries. For example, traditional
staples in north-east Brazil are more and processed food is less expensive in urban than in rural areas (Musgrove, 1988). Higher income, easier proliferation, differentiated demand, cultural heterogeneity, modern norms, and values were named as some reasons. Accordingly, urbanization, modernization and other constraints affect the nutritional lifestyles of residents.
Urban housing: The total CO2 emissions are lower in French than in German or Dutch households,duetovaryingenergymixes,climate,andlifestyles(WeberandPerrels,2000).Also compactmultistoryhousing,energy-efficiency,renewablefuelmixes,flexible public transport, centralbusinessdistricts,andmixed-usedistrictscanmakecitiesmoresustainable (Lanzendorf, 2002;vandeCoeveringandSchwanen,2006).However,thesituationalsubmatrixisoftencontrary to sustainable urban housing. A lack of affordable housing or schools, congestion, ecological trade-offs, or family reasons push young families out of the city, entrenching car use and single-family housing (Urban Task Force, 1999). This fosters vehicle-focused infrastructure andsprawled services into a downward spiral (Camagni, Gibelli and Rigamonti, 2002).
Urban,semi-urban,andruralsettingsdifferentiatethelifestylesofhealthandsocialliving (UN-Habitat, 2007). For example, road rage, over-crowding, and the lack of leisure facilities, shelter, or social infrastructure can create disturbing urban environments (Frumkin, 2003). On theotherhand,architecture ofmixedmultistoryhousing,publictransport,leisure avenues, and sports complexes attract matching lifestyles and foster recreation, social exchange,andhome values (e.g., Sallis et al., 2006). Urban planners began replacing physically separated life domains with connected adaptable districts wherein people can live, work, and recreate (UrbanTaskForce,1999). Thislimitstheneedformobilityandcreatesvaluable, attractive, and lively urban quarters. Social and ecological housing projects can also revitalize industrial sites, brownfields, and city centers (Scholz et al., 1996). Sustainable stock investmentsand gentrificationhelpagainstthenegativementalimageofdistressedneigborhoods, and induce identification, engagement, neighborhood attachment, and social restratification (Blokland, 2008; Harth, Herlyn and Scheller, 1998). The built environment shapes cultural identity, as it forms essential aspects of collective memory, regional diversity and culture (Kohler, 2002, 2008). Reflecting urban form, modes of living and site history can thus guide a conjunction of lifestyles, resource use, culture, and ecology (van de Coevering and Schwanen, 2006).
placeswherepeoplemeetaresocialsiteconditions.Becausemosturbanresidentshaveeasier accesstopark facilitiesand public spacesthan to other naturalsettings, theseneed park and recreationmanagement(Sallisetal.,2006).Morepeoplewouldbephysicallyactiveif community trails, e.g., pathways for walking, bicycling, and other activities, were well placed (Harrison, GemmellandHeller,2007). Urbangreeningcanthusserveforbothcommunitylivingandhealth.
2.2.2.2 Socio-cultural submatrix
The socio-cultural submatrix consists of culturally transmitted social structures, networks, and communication systems that affect individuals and their social processes (Bourdieu and Waquant, 1992). Lifestyles spread along social network pathways structured by homogeneity, conformity, and learning experiences of strong and mid-well acquaintances (Onnela et al., 2007; Otte, 2005). Processes of effective socialization also depend on reference lifestyles shaping the socio-cultural transmission of preferences, norms, attitudes, values, aspirations, expectations, and acceptance (Sallis et al., 2006).
Consumer behavior: Rethinking ground floor usages, reusage, and interim usages of
urban development sites and their potential for attracting people are relevant for social urban living. Local meeting points for culture, gastronomy, swaps, trade shows, and shopping can serve as interim usages to create modern urban district gentrification on former brownfields. City districts with niches for “creative class workers” (cf. Florida, 2005) with dense networks of innovative people and a diversity of human, social, and cultural capital are well positioned to prosper. Such technology clusters are said to attract young, talented, and tolerant workers, and creative professionals and migrants with novel combinations of ideas (Hoyman and Faricy, 2009). Such city districts promise to stimulate economic growth and natural outdoor amenities for a higher quality of life (McGranahan and Wojan, 2007), which can attract new urban middle-class lifestyles as Western cities change from production to branded sites.
Public health: Socio-culturalcomponentshelpto actualize health lifestyles. A social spread was found for the transmission of obesity, depression, and hard drinking, as well as for happiness and willingness to quit smoking (Christakis and Fowler, 2007; Fowler and Christakis,2008;SmithandChristakis,2008).Amongthesocio-culturalcorrelates for walking and cycling can be knowing regular exercisers, having an exercise partner, or having a club
membership. Further evidence has shown that urban Latinas are at higher risk for cardiovascular disease and stroke than urban white women, possibly due to the cultural mediation of less physical activity and higher rates of obesity (Wilbur et al., 2003). Social support in neigborhooods and by peers makes physical activity easy and enjoyable, which supports self-esteem and quailty of life throughout the life cycle (Sugiyama and Ward Thompson, 2007; Yarcheski, Mahon and Yarcheski, 2003). This evidence suggests that socio-cultural components are relevant for urban public health.
Urban housing: The social milieu is the environment of human relationships in which
people carry out their socially aggregated activities. They generate distinct patterns of urban living, and their lifestyles serve as strategic means for making social contacts (Diaz-Bone, 2003). For example, lifestyles of young urbanite parents living centrally actively depend on functional social milieus. They enable gentrification, cultural living, social exchange, and working (Karsten, 2003). The transmission of acculturation, social class, and lifestyle choices influence decisions on where to live and spatial assimilation of immigrants (Yu and Myers, 2007). Several historical studies have also shown that connecting urban lifestyles to socio- cultural change provides an understanding of urban living (Kriese and Scholz, submitted; Maderthaner and Musner, 2003; Ward et al., 2007).
Enhancing district identification is a challenge for sustainable urban planning. Lacking neighborhoodattachmentcanbedue tonegativementalgeographies anda“spoiled identity” of subsidized housing, ghettos, and disadvantaged residential areas. This leads to self-stigmatization,demotivationof residents, segregation, and lack of identification (Lee and Murie, 1999:637). Social area analyses of urban geography need to consider the cultural and symbolic properties of lifestyles that lead to socially segregated networks (Helbrecht and Pohl, 1995). Communication among societal subgroups on their biased mutual beliefs aids in an understanding of safety, space,socialbehavior,and physical activity (Tallon and Bromley, 2004). The Chicago School of Sociology examined how social problems of fast urbanization and the differentiation of subcultures, milieus, styles of action, and socialdisintegration come about (Park,BurgessandMcKenzie,1974). In ghettossuffering fromviolence and alcoholism, structural changes of an excluded underclass are associatedwith anxiety,insecurity,hostility,a morphingof identityandcommunity,anderodingsocialbonds (Winlow and Hall, 2006). Such dysfunctional social environments result in stress, feelings of unsafety, fear of crime and
outdoor activity,alienation,oroutwardmigration.
Providingavarietyofsocialcapitalsuch as voluntary participation in community-based associations,companionship, care, economics, and local activities fosters the networking of elderly people (Selvaratnam and Tin, 2007). This counters social exclusion, loneliness, desolation, depression,andmarginalization.Modernizationagendasuse activecitizenship in underprivileged districts and use local governance, tenant empowerment, or district management for gentrification (Franke, 2007; McKee and Cooper, 2008). It enhances community spirit, residential collaboration, community-based initiative, and district cleanliness,whileavoidingsocialconflicts,littering,substanceabuse,vandalism,and crime.
The socio-cultural submatrix is also important for the work life. For example, a cultural shift positively affects social support at work for female Mexican-Americans, whereas cultural resistance or cultural incorporation enhance work stability (Rojas and Metoyer,1995). Moreover,alowcomplexity of links between organizational units and high social density of employees is a marker for informational silos that makeorganizationsless efficient (Merrill et al., 2008). Thus, socio-cultural components ofethnicityandorganizational culture affect the efficacy of working spheres.