Investigating the Factors Affecting Urban Stress in World Literature

Urban residents are exposed to high levels of stressors and this exposure is the cause of the prevalence of their mental illness. Nevertheless, despite the importance of mental health and urban stress, few studies have been focused on the potential links between environmental aspects and mental health, and there has been a lack of research on urban stressors. It is of high importance, however, to focus on the characteristics of the urban context affecting this issue and reduce them in the development of urban planning and design of stress therapists. For this purpose, this study was conducted to investigate the factors affecting urban stress, expressed in related documents and research. A systematic review of theoretical foundations has been done for data collection and a content analysis method has been applied for data analysis. Findings indicate that urban stress is mostly due to social stressors such as population density (very high or very low), social isolation, social deprivation, and poor social interactions, as well as environmental stressors such as noise pollution and air pollution. Following these ones, job insecurity and unemployment, injustice in the city, high traffic density, lack of green space and poor access to it, lack of adequate educational opportunities, low quality housing, ethnic or group minority and economic and social status are the next important factors. As a result, high stress in cities, compared to rural areas, is due to social and environmental factors. Thus, policy makers, planners, designers and architects should identify the stressors and reduce them in the urban environment.