ANALYSIS OF THE PHYSICAL SPACE OF HIGHER EDUCATION WITH AN EMPHASIS ON SOCIAL AND CULTURAL FACTORS

Educational environment as one of the most important urban spaces should be taken into consideration. Obviously, architectural features of educational units are considered an important factor affecting the success of the educational structure. This study analyzed the space of higher education with an emphasis on cultural and social factors. Research methodology is dealing with the problem and field study. In other words, this research is an applied research and it is the kind of descriptive and analytical. The study population included students in different courses at Iranian governmental universities and professors and experts in these centers. Research findings showed that independent variables such as naturalism, amount of spatial coherence and the availability of space were studied with the dependent variable of attitude towards improve educational quality. Naturalism and spatial coherence variables compared to other variables had the highest correlation with the improvement of educational quality. Moreover, it became clear that there is a conflict between the status quo of physical spaces in universities and cultural perspectives and performance of the students. Furthermore, according to the results obtained from professors and experts, we can say that policymaking at the macro level in relation to the cultural policy based on cultural principles and culture of students, compliance of spaces in universities with traditional and modern culture, creating spaces with Iranian and Islamic identity and create spaces for security, safety and welfare of students are the most influential ideas on improving physical space in order to improve students' cultural and social issues.