Original ResearchInfluence of urban neighbourhood environment on physical activity and obesity-related diseases
Introduction
Globally, obesity and obesity-related comorbidities including hypertension, diabetes mellitus and dyslipidaemia are increasing dramatically.1, 2, 3 In the US population, for example, recent data from the National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey show that the current prevalence of obesity and overweight in adults is approximately 68%.4 In Korea, the prevalence of obesity has increased annually. In 1998, the Korea National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey (KNHANES) data showed that 26.7% of Korean adults were obese, and the proportion had increased to 30.9% in 2007–2009.5 Unhealthy lifestyle is one of the main causes of these diseases. Physical activity, in particular, is believed to be an important determinant of health and body weight, but most people do not exercise regularly.6, 7
There is growing evidence that neighbourhood environment, such as green space, parks and pedestrian environment, is associated with physical activity and various health outcomes, especially obesity-related diseases.8, 9, 10, 11, 12 However, among the possible factors contributing to physical activity and obesity-related diseases, little is known about the urban neighbourhood environment, such as slopes or street patterns, and trigger factors that encourage residents to walk. Previous studies have focused on how individual elements of neighbourhood environment affect physical activity or health outcomes,13, 14, 15, 16 or how urbanization influences population health.17
It has been hypothesized that physical activity (walking, sports, etc.) is a possible mechanism that influences the relationship between neighbourhood environment and health outcomes.18 However, few studies have evaluated all the factors.
As such, this study aimed to explore the impact of urban neighbourhood environment on physical activity and obesity-related diseases.
Section snippets
Study population
Two representative urban neighbourhood communities were selected to compare the effect of neighbourhood environment on physical activity and health. The criteria for differentiating physical characteristics between the two neighbourhood communities included site planning concepts, development methods, housing types, street patterns, site slope and neighbourhood amenities, which were measured both quantitatively and qualitatively through site observation and geographic information system
Study characteristics
Sample descriptive characteristics by community are presented in Table 2. Of the 16,178 adults included in the study, 6303 lived in Community 1 and 9875 lived in Community 2. The proportion of males was 52.09% in Community 1 and 50.30% in Community 2 (P = 0.027). The average age was 47.50 years in Community 1 and 47.67 years in Community 2. Compared with Community 2, Community 1 had more residents in their twenties (9.61% vs 7.08%) and sixties (14.69% vs 9.77%), and fewer residents in their
Discussion
The results suggest that a walkable neighbourhood environment is associated with increased physical activity and walking, and decreased BMI, abdominal obesity and obesity-related diseases. Walkable environment was associated with abdominal obesity and the prevalence of hypertension and diabetes mellitus.
Previous studies found similar results for the association of neighbourhood environment with physical activity.25, 26, 27 However, it is not clear which environmental factors actually affect
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank all the participants in the 2009 national health-screening programme.
Ethical approval
The Research Ethics Board of Seoul National University hospital approved this study (IRB No. 1107-121-371).
Funding
This work was supported by the Research Affairs of Seoul National University and Seoul National University Research and Development Board Foundation, Korea (Grant Number: 800-20110045). This work was also partially supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea Grant funded by the Korean
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Cited by (0)
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BeLong Cho and Sohyun Park equally contributed to the manuscript as corresponding author.
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Hyejin Lee and Hyun-Mi Kang equally contributed to the manuscript as first author.