Exploring the spatial differentiation mechanism of amenities in traditional villages from a social-ecological system resilience perspective: a case study of Jiaozuo, China

Introduction Under the background of rapid urbanization, the resilience of social-ecological systems (SES) of traditional villages continues to weaken, leading to imbalance in resource allocation and loss of cultural heritage. Methods This study takes 53 traditional villages in Jiaozuo City as the objects, integrates the amenity theory and the SES resilience framework, constructs the evaluation index system of natural, spatial and cultural amenities, and explores their spatial differentiation characteristics and driving mechanisms by using geographic concentration index, imbalance index, spatial mismatch analysis and geographic detector. Results and Discussion It is found that: (1) All three categories of amenities exhibit concentrated yet uneven distribution patterns at the county level. (2)The spatial mismatch of the three types of amenities is significant, roughly showing four types of positive high and low mismatch and negative high and low mismatch areas, especially the cultural amenities with the other two types of mismatch is the most prominent. (3) The distribution of amenities has the spatial directionality of low elevation, gentle slope, near rivers, near roads, low population and low economy, and the explanatory power of socio-economic factor (q = 0.995) on the distribution is much larger than that of natural factor (q = 0.140). Based on the “buffer–adaptation–transformation” logic of the social-ecological system resilience chain, this study proposes four protection and development pathways for traditional villages: the agglomeration effect, polarization effect, backhaul effect, and integration effect. These pathways provide theoretical support and practical guidance for enhancing village resilience and optimizing resource allocation.