Purpose The rapid change in the context of urban housing and the spatial organization of contemporary houses caused the alteration and elimination of spaces that met the social needs of residents for centuries. With the advent of multistorey flats, houses became denser and interactive areas became more limited and were gradually eliminated. Therefore, these changes caused the loss of interaction among occupants and social stability in today's residential complexes. Accordingly, the purpose of this paper is to improve interactions between residents and raise the level of social sustainability in residential complexes by reviving the lost interactive spaces and meeting the social needs of inhabitants. Design/methodology/approach In this paper, that is, applied research, the library method and a questionnaire have been used to conduct the study. The questionnaire consists of 13 questions categorized based on five hypotheses. Findings Existing public open spaces between the blocks of residential complexes are not efficient enough to raise the interaction between residents because of some problems such as difficult access for middle and upper floors, lack of separate territories and spaces, lack of proper control and supervision and lack of privacy and security. Practical implications This paper can be helpful for researchers, designers and mass builders in the field of housing to pay attention to the social needs of occupants, as the basic needs of humans, and improve the quality of interactive spaces by realizing their problems and shortcomings. Originality/value This paper tries to improve the quality of interactive spaces based on the social needs of residents to increase the level of interaction between dwellers and creates social sustainability in the residential complexes.

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