Cultural Influences and Sustainable Housing Design: A Comprehensive Systematic Review

Abstract

Sustainable housing design is a key component of achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 11 , which aims to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable. However, cultural influences are often overlooked or neglected in the design process, leading to potential conflicts and mismatches between the intended outcomes and the actual needs and preferences of the users. This paper presents a systematic review of forty-nine published journal articles from 2009 to 2023 that explore the relationship between cultural influences and sustainable housing design in different contexts and regions. The review follows the PRISMA guidelines and uses a mixed-methods approach to synthesize the data from descriptive statistics, thematic analysis, and meta-analysis. The results reveal that cultural influences have significant impacts on various aspects of sustainable housing design, such as energy efficiency, thermal comfort, indoor air quality, water management, waste management, materials selection, spatial organization, aesthetics, and social cohesion. The paper also discusses the challenges and opportunities for integrating cultural influences into sustainable housing design and provides recommendations for future research and practice.