Measuring Resident Participation in the Renewal of Older Residential Communities in China under Policy Change

There is a growing global trend to encourage citizen participation in solving urban problems, and there is worldwide consensus that the public voice needs to be considered. This study uses an extended Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) to focus on the factors influencing resident engagement following changes in renewal strategies in older residential communities in China. Empirical analysis was carried out based on structural equation modeling (SEM) of a completed questionnaire with 865 respondents. The results showed that Neighborhood Relations (NR) had a positive impact on Participation Attitude (PA); both PA and Awareness Participation (AP) had a positive effect on Self-evaluation (SE), and SE and AP had a positive impact on Participation Guarantee (PG). A survey was also conducted on residents’ concerns and perceptions of the redevelopment of the old neighborhood, analyzing the current issues of residents’ more significant concerns. It showed that public emergencies can affect residents’ inherent perceptions. This study enriches the China-specific focus of the issue and is a reference for similar studies in the future.