Personal and environmental correlates of active travel and physical activity in a deprived urban population

David Ogilvie,Richard Mitchell,Nanette Mutrie,Mark Petticrew,Stephen Platt

doi:10.1186/1479-5868-5-43

Abstract

BackgroundEnvironmental characteristics may be associated with patterns of physical activity in general or with particular types of physical activity such as active travel (walking or cycling for transport). However, most studies in this field have been conducted in North America and Australia, and hypotheses about putative correlates should be tested in a wider range of sociospatial contexts. We therefore examined the contribution of putative personal and environmental correlates of active travel and overall physical activity in deprived urban neighbourhoods in Glasgow, Scotland as part of the baseline for a longitudinal study of the effects of opening a new urban motorway (freeway).MethodsWe conducted a postal survey of a random sample of residents (n = 1322), collecting data on socioeconomic status, perceptions of the local environment, travel behaviour, physical activity and general health and wellbeing using a new 14-item neighbourhood rating scale, a travel diary, the short form of the International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ) and the SF-8. We analysed the correlates of active travel and overall physical activity using multivariate logistic regression, first building models using personal (individual and household) explanatory variables and then adding environmental variables.ResultsActive travel was associated with being younger, living in owner-occupied accommodation, not having to travel a long distance to work and not having access to a car, whereas overall physical activity was associated with living in social rented accommodation and not being overweight. After adjusting for personal characteristics, neither perceptions of the local environment nor the objective proximity of respondents' homes to motorway or major road infrastructure explained much of the variance in active travel or overall physical activity, although we did identify a significant positive association between active travel and perceived proximity to shops.ConclusionApart from access to local amenities, environmental characteristics may have limited influence on active travel in deprived urban populations characterised by a low level of car ownership, in which people may have less capacity for making discretionary travel choices than the populations studied in most published research on the environmental correlates of physical activity.

Highlights

Environmental characteristics may be associated with patterns of physical activity in general or with particular types of physical activity such as active travel
After adjusting for individual and household characteristics, neither perceptions of the local environment nor the objective proximity of respondents' homes to motorway or major road infrastructure appeared to explain much of the variance in active travel or overall physical activity, we did find a significant positive association between active travel and perceived proximity to shops
After demographic and socioeconomic characteristics were taken into account, neither perceptions of the local environment nor objective proximity to major road infrastructure appeared to explain much of the variance in active travel or overall physical activity in this study

Summary

Introduction

Environmental characteristics may be associated with patterns of physical activity in general or with particular types of physical activity such as active travel (walking or cycling for transport). Among the correlates most frequently identified in such reviews – some ascertained using 'objective' measures, and others in terms of people's perceptions – are the aesthetic quality of the surroundings, the presence of pavements (sidewalks), the convenience of facilities for being active, the availability of green space, access to amenities (destinations) within walking or cycling distance, safety from traffic and personal attack, and the lack of heavy traffic. Some of these local characteristics reflect higher-order aspects of urban design and spatial policy such as population density, connectivity and mixed land use [6,8]. Different characteristics may be associated with different types of physical activity; for example, Owen and colleagues found that the aesthetic quality of the surroundings was associated with walking for exercise or recreation and with walking in general, but not with walking for transport, whereas perceptions of traffic were associated with walking for transport and walking in general, but not with walking for exercise or recreation [5]

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