Empirical Studies on the Perceptions and Cognition of Urban Residents Toward Agriculture and Community

For achieving our research aims, we conducted a web-based questionnaire survey among Shanghai residents. Firstly, through latent class analysis (LCA), respondents can be classified into four types: highly engaged, medium engaged, weakly engaged, and non-engaged. Of them, the highly engaged class, with a high sense of community and a high evaluation of urban agriculture, is most likely to be engaged in community reconstruction. Secondly, by cognitive map analysis, it can be found that residents’ cognitive structure of communities mainly includes five components, which are “management”, “health and environment”, “individual and family”, “medical and sanitation”, and “society and culture”. Finally, results of structural equation modeling (SEM) showed that a higher level of SC is linked to a higher level of participation in and evaluation of CGs. And, there is a positive relationship between participation in CGs and evaluation of CGs. In addition, residents’ participation in CGs and good relationships with communities can improve their satisfaction with local life.