Purpose This study aims to examine the impact of social governance and sustainability practices, in conjunction with technical maintenance services, on users’ perceptions of indoor comfort within university campuses. By addressing the underexplored relationship between social sustainability and user experience, the research seeks to provide evidence-based insights for sustainable campus facility management. Design/methodology/approach A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 221 academic and administrative staff members at Ankara University’s Besevler Campus. Data were collected using a 24-item, five-point Likert-scale questionnaire. The study used Anderson and Gerbing’s (1988) two-step structural modelling approach. In the first stage, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to validate the measurement model; in the second stage, hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the structural relationships among variables. Findings The results revealed a three-factor structure for campus facility management evaluations: indoor comfort (F1, a = 0.87), social governance and sustainability (F2, a = 0.80) and technical maintenance services (F3, a = 0.71). The social governance factor (β = 0.334, p 0.001) exerted a stronger influence on comfort perception than the technical maintenance factor (ß = 0.275, p 0.001), explaining 25.9% of the total variance (R² = 0.259). Moreover, social governance practices provided a statistically significant incremental contribution of 10.6% beyond technical maintenance (ΔR² = 0.106, p 0.001). Critical deficiencies were identified in parking (M = 2.01), recycling (M = 2.40) and bicycle infrastructure (M = 2.60). Originality/value This study empirically demonstrates that sustainable campuses cannot be achieved solely through technical efficiency but require socially inclusive governance mechanisms, user participation and environmental awareness initiatives. By quantifying the contribution of social governance practices to perceived comfort, the research expands the traditional, technically oriented facility management perspective towards a more holistic social sustainability framework and proposes 15 evidence-based strategic, tactical and operational recommendations for campus facility managers.
Güneş et al. (Mon,) studied this question.
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