PROGRESS IN GEOGRAPHY ›› 2017, Vol. 36 ›› Issue (12): 1562-1570.doi: 10.18306/dlkxjz.2017.12.011

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Quantitative evaluation of human settlement environment and influencing factors in the Bohai Rim area

Chengyi CHEN1,2(), Wenzhong ZHANG1,*(), Dongsheng ZHAN1,2, Xueli LI3   

  1. 1. Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS, Beijing 100101, China
    2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
    3. School of International Business Administration, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, Shanghai 200433, China
  • Online:2017-12-20 Published:2017-12-20
  • Contact: Wenzhong ZHANG E-mail:chenchengyi16@mails.ucas.ac.cn;zhangwz@igsnrr.ac.cn
  • Supported by:
    Key Project of National Natural Science Foundation of China, No.41230632

Abstract:

Urban human settlement environment plays a very important role in the life quality and satisfaction of urban residents. This study employed descriptive statistics and GIS mapping methods to analyze the spatial heterogeneity and socioeconomic influencing factors of human settlement environment in the Bohai Rim area. The conclusions are as follows. There are significant spatial heterogeneities in "hard" human settlement environment index (HHI), "soft" human settlement environment index (SHI), and human settlement environment quality composite index (HSCI). The quality of human settlement environment in coastal cities is significantly higher than that in inland cities. For the provincial administrative units, Liaoning has the highest HSCI; HSCI in Tianjin is the lowest. The correlation analysis between socioeconomic factors and HSCI further shows that there is no significant positive correlation between the HSCI values and the level of economic development and urbanization in the Bohai Rim area—more prosperous economy and higher urbanization rate cannot bring in higher quality of human settlement environment; but there is a significant negative correlation between the HSCI and population in the Bohai Rim area. Therefore the control of urban population in the region will be helpful for improving the quality of human settlement environment.

Key words: human settlement, Bohai Rim area, integrated evaluation, socioeconomic factors