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Journal of Geographical Sciences >

2023 , Vol. 33 >Issue 12: 2446 - 2466

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11442-023-2184-9

Research Articles

Does adaptability matter? Analyzing the characteristics and relationships of rural social space and rural life circle

  • MA Libang , 1, 2, 3 ,
  • SHI Zhihao 1 ,
  • LI Ziyan 1 ,
  • ZHU Zhihang 1 ,
  • CHEN Xianfei 1
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  • 1. College of Geography and Environmental Science, Northwest Normal University, Lanzhou 730070, China
  • 2. Key Laboratory of Resource Environment and Sustainable Development of Oasis, Gansu Province, Lanzhou 730070, China
  • 3. Northwest Institute of Urban-Rural Development and Collaborative Governance, Lanzhou 730070, China

Ma Libang (1984-), PhD and Professor, specialized in rural settlement and its spatial reconstruction. E-mail:

Received date: 2022-12-27

  Accepted date: 2023-09-12

  Online published: 2023-12-14

Supported by

National Natural Science Foundation of China(42271222)

National Natural Science Foundation of China(42201261)

Natural Science Foundation of Gansu Province(22JR5RA130)

Major Science & Technology Project of Gansu Province(22ZD6WA057)

Young Doctoral Fund of Department of Education of Gansu Province(2022QB-040)

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Abstract

The construction of rural life circle has an essential impact on the change of rural social space. Analyzing the adaptation relationship between the two can be a new content in the study of “physical-social” space. Using social behavior as a link, we construct a logical relationship framework between rural life circle and social space. Based on the survey data of Baijia village in the loess hilly region, this paper analyzes the characteristics and adaptability of the two and discusses preliminary ideas of life circle reorganization and social space reconstruction. The study results are as follows: (1) Based on the location of four types of service facilities and the travel mode of villagers, two life circles of 15 min and 25 min have been formed in Baijia village. The rural social spaces such as communicative behavior space, health seeking behavior space, leisure behavior space, and consumption behavior space show a specific concentric circle structure and unique hierarchical structure. (2) The analysis of the adaptation between them shows that the 15 min life circle in Baijia village has a high level of adaptation to communicative and leisure behavior spaces. It plays a positive feedback role in the construction of social space. However, it has a low level of adaptability to the space of health seeking and consumption behavior spaces and has a negative feedback effect on the construction of social space. The 25 min life circle is the opposite. (3) The reorganization of facility layout, hierarchical structure, and service functions in the village life circle will lead to changes in the range, frequency, and purpose of villagers’ behavioral activities, resulting in a new social spatial pattern. These findings are important for formulating village development and construction plans, improving the settlement habitat, and reconstructing the order of social life.

Key words： rural life circle; rural social space; space adaptation; reconstruction of social space; Baijia village; loess hilly region of China

Cite this article

MA Libang , SHI Zhihao , LI Ziyan , ZHU Zhihang , CHEN Xianfei . Does adaptability matter? Analyzing the characteristics and relationships of rural social space and rural life circle[J]. Journal of Geographical Sciences, 2023 , 33(12) : 2446 -2466 . DOI: 10.1007/s11442-023-2184-9

1 Introduction

Under the interaction of urbanization, informatization, globalization, and other internal and external factors, villages around the world are undergoing a series of transformation and reconstruction processes, such as the optimization of regional spatial pattern, the reorganization of social and economic forms, and the improvement of urban and rural regional functions. Inspired by the “production of space” (Lefebvre, 1991) and the “socio-spatial dialectic” (Soja, 1980), scholars have gradually shifted their understanding of rural space from physical to social representation and from objective space to subjective space. Halfacree (2006) introduced experience and living space and built a “three-fold model of rural space” based on the importance of daily life practice. Zhang (1999) argued that the rural spatial system consists of three major spatial structures: economic, social, and settlement, among which social space is the territorial structure of social activities and social interactions of rural residents. Li (2018) indicated that rural social space arises from the broad social behavior of people, which covers social, economic, and political contents. It is embodied in all aspects of daily life, such as rural organizational governance and production practices, and closely related to physical space. With the role of production of space, the traditional rural space is developing from a homogeneous pattern following geographical proximity to a heterogeneous space with exclusivity (Lu, 2020). The change of spatial function caused by the transformation of social relations and the dissimilarity of social relations caused by the change of spatial structure have become important clues for the study of rural space. The focus of study has gradually shifted from a single emphasis on physical space to a comprehensive analysis of the “physical-social” space (Yang et al., 2022). In the context of rural revitalization and national spatial planning, the study on the interaction and adaptation of “physical-social” space is conducive to grasping the characteristics and development trend of rural human-land relationship. It is crucial to promote the implementation of rural planning and infrastructure construction, guide the development of rural social activities, and reorganize social relations.
In recent years, geographers have become increasingly concerned with the physical and social space of the rural. The study themes and contents tend to be diversified. Among the studies on physical space, the rural “production-living-ecological” space is regarded as an important carrier for land resource planning and management (Liao et al., 2022). Scholars generally believe that a scientific and rational space restructuring is conducive to the sustainable use of land resources and the enhancement of rural functions (Fu et al., 2022; Shi et al., 2022). In particular, rural living space is a spatial complex composed of rural residents’ living, leisure, social, consumption and other activities (Yu et al., 2017). In the context of urban-rural integration development, rural living space is undergoing significant changes. Rural human living environment (Zhao et al., 2019; Ward et al., 2021), public services & public space (Veitch et al., 2013; Abate et al., 2020; Agboola, 2022) and rural life circle (Tian et al., 2018; Yang et al., 2019) have become the hot spots of study in this field. As for social space, urban geographers understand it as the space occupied by social groups with common socio-economic attributes, clans and races or psychological perception (Buttimer, 1969; Gregory et al., 2009). Drawing on this thinking, Long (2015) analyzed the differentiation of social space in tourist villages from the living environment, occupation, income structure, and social relationship structure. Shen (2022) used individual spatio-temporal proximity index to analyze the social space differentiation of groups with different registered residence types in townships. The behavioral school regards social space as a space generated by behavior and social networks, a relational space composed of social relations with no or blurred boundaries (Claval, 1973; Lin, 2009). Drawing on this thinking, some scholars applied the social network analysis method to analyze rural social space’s evolution and driving mechanism (Lu and Yu, 2020). The changes in social relations caused by external forces have become an important force affecting rural social space (Liu et al., 2014). In the analytical framework of the “socio-spatial” dialectic, some scholars also emphasized the role of capital and authority in changing social space (Weng and Yang, 2020; Wu et al., 2020). They argued that the changes in production methods and production relations inevitably give birth to changes in spatial carriers, which continue to act on the evolution of social space. During this process, the traditional social network of the village was gradually broken, the social order structure was gradually misadjusted, and the social space was increasingly complicated (Li et al., 2022).
However, there are few studies on the comprehensive analysis of “physical-social” space, and most of them are conducted in the framework of rural space system. Qu (2021) believed that the transformation of rural settlements is the change of physical space and social space from homogeneous to heterogeneous. Realizing the coordinated development between physical space and social space plays a vital role in rural revitalization (Qu et al., 2021). Later, the two spaces mentioned by Qu were applied to the theoretical study of the “physical-social” space of traditional villages (Li et al., 2022; Yang et al., 2022). In addition, the two-way interaction of “physical-social” space also received some attention, but the relevant studies only focused on urban villages and resettlement communities (Zhang et al., 2014; Zhou and Xiong, 2019).
The literature review shows that the comprehensive analysis of the “physical-social” space needs to be further strengthened compared to the single physical or social space. The construction of rural life circle emphasizes the completeness and accessibility of various service facilities, while the social space from the behavioral perspective emphasizes the social construction of residents’ various daily activities. Analyzing the adaptation relationship between the two can be a new content in the study of “physical-social” space. The Loess Hilly Region is a typical ecologically fragile and underdeveloped mountainous area in China, where transportation is difficult, villages are scattered, economy is backward and facilities are lacking. In order to meet the realistic needs of transformation of human-land relations and rural revitalization in the new era and guide the benign development of space and society in mountainous villages, it is necessary to study the characteristics and relationships of rural life circle and social space. Therefore, this study focuses on the following issues: (1) constructing a logical relationship framework between rural life circle and social space using social behavior as a link; (2) identifying rural life circle and rural social space based on the survey and interview data of Baijia village; and (3) analyzing the adaptation relationship between the rural life circle and rural social space, and discussing preliminary ideas of life circle reorganization and social space reconstruction. These studies are important for formulating village development and construction plans, improving the settlement habitat, and reconstructing the order of social life.

2 Theoretical basis and analytical framework

Before studying the relationship between rural life circle and rural social space, this paper first analyzed the theoretical content of the two. Then, we established an analytical framework for the relationship between them to guide the reorganization of life circle and reconstruction of social space.

2.1 The theoretical analysis

2.1.1 Rural social space

The rural social space system is one of the various forms of the regional system of man-land relationship. It represents the interaction between the rural subject and the geographical environment in the rural social practice (Hu et al., 2019). Behavior space is a part of social space from the perspective of individual behavior (Halás and Klapka, 2021). Under certain social, economic, institutional, and cultural backgrounds, behavior subjects have formed clear cognition and preference for space and are subject to various constraints from time and space. Under the effect of subjective decisions and objective constraints, behavior subjects have various behaviors and form corresponding social spaces. In addition, behavior subjects break the existing spatial arrangements by participating in various social activities and build different social spaces across boundaries to show the social needs of rural residents (Si, 2004). Therefore, the operation of the rural social space system is essentially an external expression of the social behavior of rural residents. The rural social space system is a territorial structure formed on the basis of the social behavior of rural residents, covering social, economic, political, etc. This is shown in all aspects of daily life, such as the governance of rural organizations and production practices. In the process of industrialization and urbanization, the geographical and kinship relationship of the behavior subjects have gradually changed into professional relationship. This results in the differentiation of rural social classes and the transformation of grassroots governance models. The changes in their daily life and production practices have formed new social spaces. In addition, villagers have moved from rural areas to cities in the process of large-scale population flow and relocation of rural settlements. The land use models and functions have become more diverse, and residential areas have changed from dispersion to agglomeration. These lead to the reorganization of rural social space (Wu et al., 2022). At present, China’s rural development presents unprecedented opportunities and challenges, and the rural has entered a transition period of dramatic reconstruction. In the Rural Revitalization Strategy, the rural society, economy, politics, culture, and other aspects will undergo great transformation in the future, and the rural social space system will show different structural characteristics.

2.1.2 Rural life circle

In geography and urban planning, the life circle is defined as the spatial form occupied by residents’ daily activities and characterized by certain directions and distances, that is, the mapping area of daily life in geographic space. It covers the spatial extent of the residents’ necessary activities and is essentially a functional region based on the aggregation of the frequency and range of individual travel activities (Chai, 1996). It follows that the life circle is constituted on the basis of the activity patterns formed by the interaction of individual residents with spatial facilities in time and space (Xiao et al., 2014). At the theoretical model level, the life circle has significant circle characteristics, because the spatial structure of people’s daily activity trajectory is mainly reflected in the “place-path-network” surface structure. Its concrete form is characterized by concentric circles and is influenced by various factors such as population, economy, road traffic, and natural conditions in the region. At the practical application level, the core concept of the life circle is to provide equalized service facilities and a suitable living environment for urban and rural residents. It focuses on the actual needs of residents, the accessibility of facilities, and the efficiency of resource utilization. Building a life circle to scientifically and effectively organize living space is conducive to the rational allocation of resources, the protection of social livelihood, and the maintenance of spatial justice.
There are differences between rural life circle and urban life circle regarding connotation and logic. Compared to urbanized areas with relatively continuous space and more developed functions, rural areas have lower population and building density, are relatively dispersed, and lack public services. In addition, rural residents’ daily travel patterns differ from those in cities. Their travel distances and time are longer, and communication methods are more fixed. Therefore, this paper defined the rural life circle as a spatial range with directionality and circles formed by residents within a certain rural social and geographical system to meet practical needs such as interaction, medical treatment, schooling, consumption, and leisure and to obtain basic public and market services through travel modes. It is determined by the trajectories of residents’ round-trip activities between settlements and facilities. The distances to different service facilities are different, and the corresponding life circle’s radius is different, forming distinct circle structures in space. In rural areas, the life circle includes not only the villages where people live, but also the surrounding areas that are closely related to their daily production and social activities, etc.

2.2 The logical relationship between rural life circle and rural social space

China is in the process of rapid industrialization and urbanization. The production methods, lifestyles, social and economic patterns, and spatial patterns of villages in China are drastically changing from traditional to modern with the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy and the promotion of agricultural and rural modernization (Long and Tu, 2017; Liu and Wang, 2018). Under these backgrounds, the internal and external factors for the development of rural behavior subjects are constantly changing. First, better policies and systems, construction action, resources and technology can promote rural and peasant development. Second, the quality capacity and capital level of all kinds of behavior subjects participating in rural construction have been improved, and their awareness of roles and autonomy has been increased. The demands of rural residents for compact, complete, and convenient living spaces are continuously satisfied and increasing. In addition, rural residents in a way that generate various demands in the correlation mechanism between rural life circle and rural social space.
The rural life circle and rural social space are connected by social behavior subjects. They interact and correlate with each other and have a strict logical relationship. Under the influence of internal and external factors, behavior subjects put forward new requirements for reorganizing the rural life circle by generating different needs. The reorganized rural life circle further plays its role as the material carrier of social behavior. The behavior subjects further adjust their behaviors after receiving positive feedback from the life circle, leading to the reconstruction of the rural social space. Then, the stabilized social space structure can guide or regulate the behavior decisions of the subjects in the next stage. In sum, there is a logical chain of “driving force - generating demand - reorganizing life circle - acting as a carrier - adjusting behavior - reconstructing social space - guiding decision” among them (Figure 1). Theoretically, due to the driving force being continuous and rising, the rural life circle and rural social space are constantly in a state of non-adaptation and adaptation in this dynamic process. Only if the objective conditions of the rural life circle well meet the subjective and purposeful needs of the subjects, and the construction of social space occurs within the rural life circle, do they reach a state of mutual adaptation and matching. In reality, however, the supply of service facilities is mostly the product of the traditional mode of life and production, that is, standardized and relatively centralized allocation according to the administrative level. Even if the subjects propose new demands, it is difficult to reorganize the life circle. It indicates severe shortcomings in the level, distribution, and function of the services in the life circle. Accordingly, the frequency, range, and purpose of the social activities of the subjects are also affected. The subjects living in this space have to adapt their behaviors to meet individual needs. This expands the construction of rural social space to the outside of the life circle, resulting in a mismatch between the life circle and the social space.
Figure 1 The logical relationship framework between rural life circle and rural social space
In general, the rural life circle is the physical spatial carrier of residents’ behaviors, while the rural social space is the spatial representation of the social relations based on residents’ behavior. They have two-way interaction. The objective conditions of the rural life circle restrict or promote the construction of the rural social space by affecting the social activities of the subjects. Rural social space reorganizes the rural life circle through the subjective and purposive needs of behavior subjects. They can have adaptability only if they reach the stage of mutual adaptation and matching.

3 Materials and methods

3.1 Study area

Baijia village is located at 103°31'12"-103°33'16"E, 35°29'53"-35°31'54"N. It belongs to Zhaojia township, Dongxiang county, Gansu province, China. It is located in Longzhong loess hilly region, with a total area of 6.55 km2 (Figure 2). The terrain is dominated by loess ridges and valleys, with an altitude of 2042-2300 m. Baijia village governs 14 communities, with 2445 registered residents, 2282 permanent residents, and 1100 labor forces. The village is crossed by the highway, and the external traffic is relatively convenient, about 6 km away from Zhaojia township and 5 km away from Guanghe county. Breeding (cattle and sheep) is the leading industry in the village, while planting, catering and labor services are auxiliary industries. The public service facilities in Baijia village are inefficient, low-level, and misplaced with the structure chosen by villagers, which could not meet the diversified living needs of residents.
Figure 2 Survey map of the study area (Zhaojia township, Dongxiang county, Gansu province, China)
Baijia village is selected as a case area for the following reasons. First, Baijia village is located in loess hilly region with long gullies and ravines. It exhibits the common characteristics of underdeveloped mountainous villages, including dispersed populations and settlements, traditional modes of agricultural production, imperfect infrastructure and services, and difficulties in constructing life circle. In similar geographical settings, its social space also distinctly reflects the characteristics of rural social space in underdeveloped mountainous areas, serving as a microcosm of the social space in rural areas within loess hilly region. Secondly, the village is located at the midpoint of the road from Zhaojia township to Guanghe county with several external links nearby, thus providing a diversified environment for residents’ behavioral decision-making. Finally, Baijia village was listed as a county-level demonstration village for rural revitalization and was positioned as a cluster-enhancing village in national territory spatial planning. Exploring the characteristics and relationships of the village’s “physical-social” space is conducive to designing effective policies and serves as a model for the spatial optimization of similar villages.

3.2 Study design

This study mainly investigated the data related to rural life circle and residents’ social behavior. The study design includes three stages, which are detailed below. The study design consisted of three phases, as detailed below.
Phase I. Pre-preparation and respondents
Based on the pre-survey, we designed questionnaires about the village and villagers (Table 1). The village questionnaire mainly covers the history of village evolution, population and structure, land use and structure, socio-economic development, etc. The villagers’ questionnaire includes basic information of residents, communicative behavior, education and health seeking behavior, leisure behavior, consumption behavior, and political participation. Respondents covered village cadres, the presidents of farmers’ cooperatives, large-scale farmers, and ordinary villagers.
Table 1 Key questions covered in the village questionnaire and the villagers’ questionnaire
The village questionnaire 1. Population size and structure. 2. Social security. 3. Public service facility (such as quantity and area of educational, medical, commercial, and sports facilities). 4. Infrastructure (such as quantity and area of bus stops, public parking lots, and the prevalence rate of tap water and sanitary toilets). 5. Income and consumption. 6. Population mobility and migrant workers (such as main reasons and forms of population migration, location and duration of migrant workers). 7. Industrial development (such as the number of new business entities, the cultivation area of grain and cash crops, and the number of villagers engaged in e-commerce, tourism, and agricultural product processing). 8. Homestead use (such as the number of homesteads with different idle periods). 9. Village cadres (such as their post, gender, age, income, education).
The villagers’ questionnaire 1. Profile of respondents (such as gender, age, education, occupation and health status). 2. Satisfaction assessment (respondents’ satisfaction with education, medical services, transportation, neighborhoods, etc.). 3. Production, income and consumption of the respondent’s household. 4. Respondents’ communicative behavior (type, purpose, mode, location and frequency of communicative behavior). 5. Respondents’ health seeking behavior (type of disease, location and frequency of health seeking behavior). 6. Respondents’ leisure behavior (type, location and frequency of leisure behavior). 7. Respondents’ consumption behavior (type, location and frequency of consumption behavior). 8. Political participation of respondents.
Phase II. Interviews and surveys
Based on the Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA), the researchers conducted interviews and surveys in Baijia village for 14 days in July and August 2021. Semi-structured interviews and questionnaires were used for rural political elites, and each person was interviewed for about 2 hours. We mainly used questionnaires for rural economic elites and ordinary villagers, and each survey took about 40 minutes per person. Based on the number of households in each village community, we surveyed local residents in equal proportions following the randomization principle, and each household was assigned no more than one respondent. Finally, we collected detailed village questionnaire and 210 validated villagers’ questionnaires, the latter covering 52% of the households in the village. The questionnaire was coded and verified to form a complete database as the basis of this study.
Phase III. Spatial analysis and visual representation
In this phase, the rural life circle of Baijia village was measured, and various social spaces were visually expressed. Due to the starting and ending point relationship between settlements and service facilities, the location of the settlement meets the optimal service range of the service facility configuration point, and it is equivalent to the service facility within the acceptable range of daily activities for residents. Therefore, this paper evaluated the current life circle based on the cost of villagers’ time for different levels of public services. Firstly, using ArcGIS software, this study employed land transformation survey data, cadastral data, and POI data to extract 487 residential points, 4 categories of facility points, and a detailed road network. These results were corrected by the high-precision orthophoto map from UAV. After that, based on the actual traffic conditions in Baijia village, concerning the existing delineation methods and the Technical Standards for Highway Engineering (JTGB01-2019), three service radii of 15 min walk (800 m), 15 min motorcycle (5000 m), and 25 min motorcycle (8333 m) were set up for the life circle measure. Finally, using the UNA tool based on Rhino software, we obtained the range of different levels and types of service facilities under different time costs, with the service facility allocation point as the starting point and settlements in Baijia as the ending point. As for social space, this study analyzed the villagers’ various types of social behaviors using the observational method and the inductive method to summarize the structural characteristics of multiple types of social space and express them in the form of diagrams.

4 Results

4.1 Measurement of the rural life circle

4.1.1 Basic characteristics of service facilities

Based on the types of rural social behavior and the survey results, this paper divided the service facilities into four categories: shopping service, healthcare service, sports recreation service, and administrative service (Figure 3), and studied the characteristics of the service facilities inside and outside the village.
Figure 3 Distribution of service facilities
In general, Baijia village has a complete variety of service facilities, but there are problems such as a small number of facilities, poor service quality and uneven spatial distribution. At present, there are 4 shopping service facilities in the village. All of them are small supermarkets. Except for the supermarket in Baijia community, the other 3 are distributed along the Zhaoguang Highway at the edge of the village. There are also 2 sports recreation service facilities in the village. One is located in the cultural square of the village committee, and its sports equipment has been seriously damaged. The other is located in the hardened open space of Gada community. There are no other facilities except a few stone benches and a small amount of miniature sports equipment. In addition, the service facilities are characterized by centralized allocation and construction. Baijia community formed a cluster of facilities with the village committee as the core and the coexistence of village clinics, cultural squares, and small supermarkets.
Due to the lack of service facilities and the low level of service in the village, the residents often go to higher-level facilities outside the village to meet their needs. The investi-gation shows that most residents obtain relevant services from Guanghe county, which is close to Baijia, and the location of the township government. Because there is no significant hierarchical difference in shopping service, and healthcare service facilities of Zhaojia township and Baijia village, this paper only selected the township health center and the township government as the high-level facilities for healthcare and administration. Many residents obtain services in their daily life from Guanghe county because of the large number of facilities. Based on the interviews with villagers, this paper took 3 large business districts, 3 general hospitals and 4 sports recreation places in the county as high-level facilities for shopping service, healthcare service, sports recreation service, respectively.

4.1.2 Analysis of the rural life circle

Based on the interview and survey results, we used the above method to measure and analyze the characteristics of the life circle in the case area. The results show that due to the terrain and road conditions, the residents’ short-distance travel mode is mainly by walking and motorcycle, while the long-distance travel mode is mainly by motorcycle. The acceptable time for the interviewed residents to walk to the facilities in the village was 5-15 min. The acceptable time for driving a motorcycle to the facilities inside the village was 10-20 min. The acceptable time for driving a motorcycle to the facilities outside the village was 20-30 min. Based on the actual traffic conditions in Baijia village, with reference to the existing delineation methods and the Technical Standards for Highway Engineering (JTGB01-2019), this paper measured the life circle of Baijia village with the combination of three travel times and travel modes: 15 min walk (800 m), 15 min motorcycle (5000 m) and 25 min motorcycle (8333 m) (Figure 4). These combinations are not simple circle concepts but irregular space-time categories with dual concepts of time and distance, formed accord ing to people’s travel characteristics with facilities as the central point and the surrounding rural roads as the network.
Figure 4 Radiation range of service facilities with different travel modes
The results show that travel modes significantly limit the accessibility of facilities inside the village. There were 84, 49, 98, and 49 residential areas where residents could walk to shopping, healthcare, sports, recreation, and administrative services within 15 minutes (Table 2). All of them were less than 21% of the total residential areas. Among them, shopping service facilities mainly serve Baijia community and Tiemaomao community, sports recreation service facilities mainly serve Baijia community and Gada community, and healthcare service and administrative service facilities radiate mainly serve Baijia community. Only if motorcycles are selected as travel tools can all residents reach various service facilities within the village within 15 minutes.
Table 2 Results of service level measurement of community life circle in Baijia village
Combination Inside the village Outside the village
Shopping service Healthcare service Sports recreation service Administrative service Shopping service Healthcare service Sports recreation service Administrative service
15 min walk 84 49 98 49 0 0 0 0
15 min
motorcycle		 487 487 487 487 31 120 14 22
25 min
motorcycle		 487 487 487 487 476 487 459 440
Because Baijia is far away from the facilities outside the village, residents cannot reach it on foot in a short time, so they choose motorcycles as travel tools in daily life. The results show that the number of residences where residents can drive motorcycles to reach the four types of service facilities outside the village within 15 min were 31, 120, 14, and 22, respectively (Table 2). Except for the residences that reach the healthcare service facilities, the rest were less than 7% of the total number of settlements, and the reachable residences were all located on the north and south fringes of the village. When residents were willing to spend a longer time (25 min) traveling, the number of residential areas that drive motorcycles to the four types of service facilities outside the village increased to 476, 487, 459, and 440, respectively (Table 2). The proportions are more than 90% of the total number of service facilities.
In general, the 15 min life circle provides services based on various facilities in the village. The 15 min life circle formed by walking only covers a small part of the villagers in Baijia village, while the 15 min life circle formed by motorcycle can cover all the villagers. The 25 min life circle is mainly based on various facilities outside the village (especially in Guanghe county). The 25 min life circle formed by motorcycle can cover most of the villagers.

4.2 Identification of the rural social space

Rural social space is the activity space formed by rural social actors in direct contact with their environment or engaged in different social practices. The behaviors of communication, seeking health, leisure, and consumption that take place in the physical space contribute to the social construction of the living environment by villagers and other subjects. This makes it a different type of social space from a physical place. Based on this relationship, this paper studied a rural social space from the perspective of social behaviors. We analyzed various social behaviors to summarize the structural characteristics of rural social spaces in Baijia village.

4.2.1 Communicative behavior space

Communicative behavior is the most basic social behavior of residents, which varies with the purpose, form, and frequency of communication. The survey shows that neighborhood communication is the core part of social communication of rural residents. The communication is rich and frequent. Some 54.29% of respondents communicated with neighbors once a day or more, mainly in face-to-face communication, and the communication radius is maintained within 200 m. Its primary purpose is daily gossip and agricultural activities. The frequency of communication between the respondents and other residents in the same village community was the second. Some 50.47% of the respondents believed that the proximity (within 2 km) was the main reason why they chose to communicate with other residents in the community. Most of them were face-to-face communication, with the same purpose as neighborhood communication. The interviewees communicated relatively little with other residents inside the village, and the frequency was also low. Due to the long distance, inconvenient travel, and weak communication motivation, 35.71% of the respondents maintained low-frequency communication with other villagers in the village 2-3 times a month. The reasons for communication were participation in major events such as weddings, funerals, and marriages in the village. In communicating with people outside the village, the interviewees mainly communicate with relatives and friends. This is an important part of their social communication network. However, the distance has alienated the relationship between relatives and friends to some extent. Some 80.48% of the villagers maintained low-frequency communication with the residents outside the village 2-3 times a year.
In addition, the respondents have contacts with the village committee and the township government because of the need to handle affairs. The survey found that the respondents were less motivated to accept government information and participate in villagers’ autonomy. Some 67.14% of the respondents go to the village committee 4-6 times yearly, mainly to participate in the quarterly village meeting. These residents did not have strong political awareness and were far away from the village committee. They were not keen on participating in political activities. In contrast, 20.48% of the respondents visited the village committee almost weekly. These groups were mainly village cadres, village community leaders and a few villagers with high enthusiasm. They have high political awareness and believe government policies are closely related to their lives. Some 12.38% of the respondents went there once a month, mainly to understand the relevant policies. In addition, the connections between villagers and the township government are less, and there are significant group differences. The survey found that 71.90% of the respondents went once or twice a year. Most of them are ordinary villagers who need to handle civil affairs, medical insurance and other businesses. Due to the long journey and poor road conditions, they go to the township government only if they need the help of relevant departments to solve their vital interests. Some 10.48% of the respondents maintained the frequency of visiting the township government once a month. They are mainly the group consisting of village cadres and village community leaders. They often went there for meetings and needed to work with other cadres and superiors. The other 17.62% of the respondents basically visit once a quarter. Most of these respondents are core members of cooperatives and large-scale farmers. As an important target of government subsidies and subsidized loans, they often contact the township government for their vital interests.
The above analysis shows that the communicative behavior space of Baijia village has a general circle structure and a special hierarchical structure (Figure 5). For ordinary residents, because the way of face-to-face communication is greatly limited by geographical distance, they often decide whether to contact others based on the importance of the purpose of communication. This makes the frequency of their daily communication generally show the characteristics of “neighborhood, inside the same village community, inside the village but outside the same community, outside the village.”
Figure 5 Social space diagram of Baijia village

4.2.2 Health seeking behavior space

Health seeking behavior refers to the health service utilization behavior and health promotion behavior made by individuals for abnormal body symptoms (Granovetter, 1992). It is a rational decision based on self-cognition and environmental cognition. Different diseases and groups have distinct characteristics of health seeking behavior. The survey indicates that most respondents suffered from mild diseases such as common cold (47.62%) and cough (32.38%) within one year. Individual respondents had moderate diseases (12.86%), such as hypertension and hyperglycemia, and severe diseases (7.12%), such as malignancy and multiple organ failure. When suffering from mild diseases, only 9.1% of the respondents were willing to seek medical treatment in the village clinic, and these individuals tended to live around the village clinic. Some 4.17% of the respondents are willing to go to the township hospital for medical treatment. They mainly lived in the north of Baijia village and believed that the township hospital could treat mild diseases such as cold and fever. Some 86.31% of the respondents can visit the hospitals in Guanghe county for medical treatment. These people generally believed that the quality of medical services in village clinics and township hospitals was low. Under the same medical expenses, they prefer to go to Guanghe county, where the distance for medical treatment is closer and the medical level is higher. In addition, 66.67% of the respondents chose to go to Lanzhou to treat moderate or severe diseases medically. The remaining 23.81% and 9.52% of the respondents chose to go to Linxia city and Guanghe county for medical treatment.
The above analysis shows that the villagers’ medical seeking behavior is closely related to the accessibility of medical resources, the quality of medical services and the severity of diseases. Under the comprehensive influence of the above factors, the medical behavior space of Baijia village has specific hierarchical structure characteristics and is significantly limited by geographical space (Figure 5). Specifically, in the case of mild diseases, the medical behavior space has the weak hierarchical characteristics of “Guanghe county-village clinic-township hospital.” In the case of moderate and severe diseases, the behavior space of villagers seeking medical treatment has a strong hierarchical feature of “Lanzhou city-Linxia city-Guanghe county.”

4.2.3 Leisure behavior space

From a behavioral perspective, leisure is a series of recreational activities in free time away from work and the chores of daily life. Because the leisure places in Baijia village mainly comprise sports and fitness facilities, this paper mainly studies villagers’ leisure behavior in terms of sports. The survey shows that 64.29% of the respondents have a strong demand for sports leisure, the main groups were students and young adults. They feel that the equipment of the two sports and leisure facilities in the village is old and seriously damaged, which is far from meeting their own leisure needs. Even so, the cultural square jointly built with the village committee is still their first choice for leisure and entertainment, because it is a free public space with relatively complete surrounding facilities and short distances. Some 26.19% of the respondents had less demand for leisure and entertainment. These people focused on agricultural activities and lacked time and interest to go for leisure and entertainment. The remaining 9.52% of the respondents are mostly the elder, who have little demand for such places.
The above analysis shows that students and young people are the main body of sports leisure behavior. The leisure behavior space in Baijia village is strongly restricted by material factors. Its participants and place of occurrence are relatively single (Figure 5). The perfection of facilities, social accessibility, economic accessibility, and distance reachability are the main considerations for the respondents to choose sport leisure sites.

4.2.4 Consumption behavior space

The villagers’ consumption behavior generally includes productive consumption and living consumption. Productive consumption is the consumption behavior to meet the villagers’ productive activities, such as purchasing chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and forages for livestock. Living consumption is a consumption behavior to meet the basic living needs of villagers, such as food, clothing, housing, and transportation. Guanghe county is the leading destination for the above two consumption behaviors. The small supermarket in the village can only meet some shopping needs of villagers’ daily necessities. The productive consumption behavior in Baijia village is relatively frequent, mainly based on purchasing of agricultural production or breeding inputs. Some 40.48% of the respondents maintained the productive consumption behavior at least once a month, and they mostly adopt the livelihood strategy of “small-scale breeding + grain planting.” Some 12.38% of the respondents maintained a frequency of 2-3 times a month, and these respondents were mainly large-scale farmers and other economic elites. Some 47.14% of the respondents had a frequency of half a year, and they mostly adopted the livelihood strategy of “food planting + short-term migrant workers” or “single food planting.”
Living consumption is dominated by food consumption (meat, vegetables, eggs, etc.) and consumption of daily supplies (daily necessities, clothing, household appliances, etc.). Food consumption is relatively frequent, with 36.19% of respondents purchasing food every 3 days at most. Many of them have motorcycles, cars and other means of transportation. This shortens the psychological travel distance of villagers and increases their travel frequency. Some 17.14% of the respondents purchase food 1-2 times a week. Because they are busy with family affairs, they often buy large quantities at one time to reduce the frequency of travel and save time. Some 46.67% of the respondents have low frequency of food consumption. These people are mostly in left-behind families. Due to the lack of transportation or travel inconvenience, their food is mostly purchased by neighbors. In the consumption behavior of daily supplies, the shopping frequency of daily necessities is relatively high as once a week. The small supermarket in the village can meet some needs. The purchasing frequency of clothing commodities is relatively low, twice a year. Guanghe is the first purchasing destination, and Lanzhou is the second. The purchasing frequency of household appliances is the lowest. More than 90% of the respondents said that they had not purchased household appliances in the past five years, while all the respondents who had purchased household appliances were from Guanghe county.
The above analysis shows that Guanghe county is the main place for villagers’ consumption behavior. The consumption behavior space of Baijia village has the general characteristics of single-core dependence (Figure 5). The choices of villagers’ livelihood strategies are the main reasons for the spatial differentiation of productive consumption behaviors. Villagers have different demands on the quantity and types of production materials under different livelihood strategies. For the living consumption behavior space, villagers are not used to purchasing low-level goods from a distance with a sufficient supply of shopping services. When purchasing high-end products such as home appliances, villagers are most dependent on the commercial center of Guanghe county. In addition, the availability of transportation has a positive effect on expanding the space for living consumption behavior.

4.3 Adaptation analysis of rural life circle and rural social space

From the perspective of the relationship between the rural life circle and the rural social space, the objective conditions of the rural life circle restrict or promote the construction of the rural social space. The behavioral subjects in the rural social space have subjective and purposeful needs on the rural life circle. They have two-way interaction. If they reach the stage of mutual adaptation and matching, they have adaptability.

4.3.1 Adaptation analysis of 15 min rural life circle and rural social space

The results of the life circle measurement in Baijia village show that travel modes significantly limit the accessibility of facilities in the village. The accessibility of facilities in the village under walking mode is low, covering only a few villagers. Only if motorcycles are selected as travel tools all villagers can reach various service facilities in the village within 15 minutes. In addition, for the social space composed of different behavior subjects, it shows that the communication behavior of villagers mainly occurs in the village. It is formed high frequency communication with neighbors within 200 m once a day or more, medium frequency communication with other villagers within 2 km of the village community, and low frequency communication with other villagers and village committee members. These analysis results indicate that the 15-minute rural life circle of Baijia village has a high level of adaptability with the space for communicative behavior and leisure behavior. This has a positive feedback effect on the construction of social space. However, it has a low level of adaptability with the health seeking behavior space and the consumption behavior space. This has a negative feedback effect on the construction of social space. It means that, if the 15 min rural life circle is more focused on the villagers’ interactive and leisure behaviors and creates public spaces dedicated to neighborhood communication and recreation based on their spatial choice preferences, the original patterns of communicative and leisure behavior spaces will be strengthened. On the contrary, if the 15 min rural life circle concerns more about the villagers’ demand for healthcare and consumption and devotes itself to creating healthcare and consumption places with greater service capabilities, the original patterns of health seeking and consumption behavior spaces will be weakened.

4.3.2 Adaptation analysis of 25 min rural life circle and rural social space

Due to the lack of service facilities in the village and the low level of service, villagers often go to higher-level facilities outside the village to meet their own needs. If motorcycles are selected as the travel tool, more than 90% of the villagers can reach various service facilities outside the village within 25 minutes. In addition, the rural social space composed of different behavior subjects shows that the villagers’ health seeking behavior and consumption behavior mainly occur outside the village. When suffering from mild diseases, 86.31% of the respondents will go to Guanghe county for medical treatment. When suffering from moderate and severe diseases, 66.67% of the respondents choose to go to Lanzhou for treatment. The remaining 23.81% and 9.52% of the respondents chose to go to Linxia city and Guanghe county for treatment, respectively. In addition, because the small supermarkets in the village cannot meet the other shopping needs of villagers except for daily necessities, Guanghe county has become the main destination for villagers’ consumption behavior with complete shopping facilities and relatively close distances. Due to the imperfect construction of the life circle in the village, villagers need to spend more time, use more convenient tools and even spend more money to meet their own living needs. As a result, the construction of social space mainly occurs in the material space outside the village with Guanghe county as the core. In general, the 25 min rural life circle of Baijia village has a high level of adaptability with the villagers’ health seeking behavior space and consumption behavior space. This plays a positive feedback role in the construction of social space. It has a low level of adaptability with communicative behavior space and leisure behavior space, and has a negative feedback effect on the construction of social space. Compared to the 15 min life circle, the 25 min life circle in Baijia village also involves some facilities outside the village, and emphasizes more on sharing of facilities and services between urban and rural areas. If the urban-rural transportation system is more comprehensive and healthcare and finance are more inclusive, the original patterns of health seeking and consumption behavior spaces will probably be reinforced. In contrast, greater accessibility and reachability of leisure places outside the village would provide villagers with more options for leisure activities, thus constructing social spaces beyond the village confines.

5 Discussion and conclusions

5.1 Discussion

5.1.1 Guide the construction of rural life circle with behavioral activities

For a long time, the Chinese government has allocated various types of service facilities in villages from top to down according to administrative levels. The standardized and centralized allocation has seriously ignored the behavioral trajectory and practical needs of villagers (Cui et al., 2022). Therefore, building the life circle system from the bottom up is necessary by starting with the villagers’ behavior.
First, the life circle’s construction should meet the villagers’ basic needs. Daily seeking health and consumption behaviors are social activities that villagers must carry out under all circumstances to maintain their basic survival needs. Therefore, the service level of commercial and healthcare facilities within the village should be appropriately upgraded to meet the basic consumption and medical needs of villagers. Second, the construction of the life circle should consider different social groups (Zhong et al., 2022). Taking leisure behavior as an example, students and young adults spend more time and travel longer distances for sports and leisure, but other villagers rarely travel long distances to carry out such social activities. In addition, due to the different time costs of villagers for various service facilities, the frequency of their behavioral activity was decreased with the increase of distance. It shows significant spatial characteristics of circles. Therefore, high-frequency and basic service facilities should be allocated around the settlement to form a basic life circle, while low-frequency and high-level service facilities should be allocated in higher-level life circle. Finally, villagers should travel to the central village or urban areas by transportation for perfect services. Their activity trajectories were mainly around rural roads and service facilities at all levels (Székely and Novotný, 2022). Therefore, it is necessary to incorporate public transportation and road network construction into the rural life circle system.

5.1.2 Reconstruction of rural social space by reorganizing rural life circle

The reorganization of the rural life circle has an important impact on rural social relations and spatial changes. Affected by factors such as the service level of facilities and the habits of villagers’ use of facilities, the 15 min and 25 min rural life circle in Baijia village has a low adaptability to the social space formed by various behaviors to varying degrees. Therefore, it is necessary to reorganize the facility layout, hierarchical structure, and service functions of rural life circles following the actual needs of villagers to improve the service supply level of facilities. Accordingly, the range, frequency and purpose of villagers’ behavioral activities should be adjusted, resulting in the reconstruction of social space.
First, the spatial range of behavioral activities of the villagers is changed by adjusting the layout of facilities in the rural life circle. The reorganization of 15 min life circle should reasonably arrange the spatial distribution of facilities in conjunction with the population scale to avoid the increase in service radius caused by the centralized arrangement of facilities. The 25 min life circle should cover the whole area of the village. It requires optimizing the transportation conditions or changing the transportation mode to expand the service area of the facilities. The rearrangement of the distribution of facilities can change the range of behavioral activities of residents to a certain extent. This in turn will cause changes in social space. Second, the frequency of behavioral activities of residents is adjusted by optimizing the hierarchical structure of the rural life circle. Constrained by travel capacity, the frequency of behavioral activities of villagers decreases with the increase in distances (Guan et al., 2020). If multiple facilities meet a certain need simultaneously, villagers in most cases will choose the closest one in spatial distance. When a lower-level facility cannot satisfy a higher-level need, villagers will choose a higher-level facility. Therefore, it is necessary to establish the facility allocation hierarchy of “village community-administrative village- (township)-county.” The government should supplement relevant service facilities in village communities to meet the high-frequency and basic needs of villagers and increase the frequency of these behaviors within the village. Finally, the government should help villagers achieve their goals by improving the service functions of facilities at all levels in the rural life circle. The purpose of villagers’ behavior is limited by the service level of the current facilities. On the premise that all kinds of service functions are complete, villagers are not accustomed to realizing their travel purposes over long distances. Therefore, there is a need to re-evaluate the functionality of existing facilities, especially inefficient healthcare facilities (Chen et al., 2022) and dilapidated leisure facilities. After that, the facilities should be effectively supplemented and accurately configured (Rusek et al., 2018) through reconstruction, expansion, new construction and other ways to help villagers achieve their purposes at a close distance.

5.1.3 Contributions and limitations

Although this study selects only one village case as its subject, it provides novel insights into the study of rural “physical-social” space. Different from social space that emphasizes the same socio-economic attributes or the intervention of capital and power (primarily generated in urban or tourist areas), this study defined social space from the perspective of social behaviors and relationships. This interpretation underscores the villagers’ pivotal role in social space construction, aligning more closely with the operational logic of rural society. Furthermore, this paper constructed a logical relationship framework between rural life circle and rural social space with the medium of behavioral subjects and clarified the association mechanism of the two from the perspective of adaptability. These studies provide a scientific theoretical basis for the future reorganization of rural “material-social” space. Finally, this paper also proposes some important ways to build the rural life circle and reconfigure the social space. These have certain practical significance for guiding rural infrastructure allocation and spatial governance in underdeveloped mountainous areas. However, there are two shortcomings. First, limited by the study area and sample size, the differences in daily demands and social behaviors among different groups cannot be fully represented. Second, lacking a long-term tracking investigation, it is difficult to show the evolution of rural social space. In the future, the role of rural life circle in shaping social behavior and social network should be emphasized in the study of rural “material-social” space. Meanwhile, we could apply the study results of social space to spatial planning and governance, and build a rural life circle rooted in rural areas and in line with rural development, so as to form a social space with new characteristics. In addition, differentiating factors such as age, gender, occupation, family structure, and social status can be considered to analyze the daily demands and social space types of different groups. For some special cases (tourist villages, relocated villages, e-commerce villages, etc.), the theories of “actor-network” and “production of space” can be combined to analyze the role of indigenous groups, external groups, and mobile groups in rural physical space change and social space construction.

5.2 Conclusions

Taking Baijia village in the loess hilly region of China as a case, this paper studies the adaptability of rural life circle to rural social space, and proposes preliminary ideas of life circle reorganization and social space reconstruction. The study results are as follows: (1) Based on the allocation of four types of service facilities and the travel mode of villagers in Baijia village, two life circles of 15 min and 25 min have been formed. The rural social spaces such as communicative behavior space, health seeking behavior space, leisure behavior space, and consumption behavior space show a specific concentric circle structure and unique hierarchical structure. (2) The analysis of the adaptation between rural life circle and rural social space shows that the 15 min rural life circle in Baijia village has a high level of adaptation to communicative and leisure behavior spaces. It plays a positive feedback role in the construction of social space. However, it has a low level of adaptability to the space of health seeking and consumption behavior spaces, and has a negative feedback effect on the construction of social space. The 25 min rural life circle is the opposite. (3) The reorganization of facility layout, hierarchical structure and service functions in the village life circle will lead to changes in the range, frequency and purpose of villagers’ behavioral activities, which in turn will result in a new social spatial pattern.

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