About the Berkeley Housing Study

The Berkeley Housing Study and Report

Housing projects in Berkeley have to balance the interests of many different individuals and groups. Housing projects have a direct impact on people living around the new residences. And they are important to people who are looking for housing in Berkeley. Housing projects often cause strong feelings in communities.

We conducted a study whose aim was to develop knowledge about how people feel about housing projects and how they get involved. We thank the individuals and community organizations that shared a moment of their time to speak with us or take the survey.

Respondent Report
In addition to preparing results from this study for academic peer review and eventual publication in academic journals, we published a publicly accessible respondent report. This report uses survey data from 1480 residents living near three project sites (North Berkeley BART, Ashby BART, People’s Park) as well as interviews with 16 stakeholders.

Click here to view/download the report

Funding and Independence
The study was funded through two sources: (1) Erasmus University Rotterdam, specifically primary researcher Dr. Eshuis’ own research budget and a contribution from a research program at Erasmus University called ‘Vital Cities and Citizens’; (2) The Erasmus Trustfund. This is the official support-fund for Erasmus University. Its aim is to promote the flourishing of the Erasmus University Rotterdam.

The researchers have no political or financial interest regarding the housing projects that were studied, and they are independent of any party involved in the housing projects. This is an independent academic study, which means that no one outside the research team has had any influence on the study (neither on the research question nor on the analysis or the research report).

Who are the researchers?

Dr. Jasper Eshuis

Jasper Eshuis is an associate professor in Public Administration at Erasmus University Rotterdam, and a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley. He is an expert on urban governance, citizen participation, and emotions in interactions between governments and citizens. Jasper loves doing fundamental research, as well as applied research in which he aims to contribute to practice by advising public organizations, NGOs and communities. He has published widely in scientific journals such as Urban Studies, Public Administration Review, and Public Management Review.

Erasmus University Rotterdam (eur.nl)
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaspereshuis
eshuis@essb.eur.nl
Note: formerly jaspereshuis@berkeley.edu

Dr. Iris Mauss

Iris Mauss is the director of the Emotion & Emotion Regulation Lab at Berkeley (EERLAB) and  professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. She received her Ph.D. in psychology at Stanford University.

Her research focuses on emotions and emotion regulation, with an emphasis on their links to psychological health. In her research, she uses measures of emotion experience, behavior, and physiological responding.

Joseph Ocampo

Joseph Ocampo was a Doctoral candidate in Psychology at the University of California Berkeley during the study. His work focuses on emotion, measurement, and data analysis. He has a particular interest in feelings like compassion that motivate people to do good things for others and how these feelings also benefit oneself.

Snow Lin

Snow Lin was a post bachelor student in Psychology at the University of California Berkeley and research assistant in the lab during the study.

Bingyue Tan

Bingyue Tan was a post bachelor student in Psychology at the University of California Berkeley and research assistant in the lab during the study. Bing is interested and currently working on social cognition, decision making and languages.

Nicole Prislin

Nicole Prislin was an undergraduate student studying Psychology and Health & Wellness at the University of California Berkeley and a research assistant in the lab during the study.

Allison Hersh

Allison Hersh was an undergraduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, where she is majoring in Psychology during the study. She worked as a research assistant in the lab.

Contact Us

If you have any questions or concerns that you would like us to address, please don’t hesitate to contact us at:
housingstudy@berkeley.edu