Abstract
This study examines the effect of cross-level interaction between community physical environment and social capital among individuals on physical activity by considering gender difference. In this regard, we ask two research questions: (1) What is the effect of cross-level interaction between community factors and social capital among individuals on physical activity? (2) Is there gender difference in the effect of the cross-level interaction? To examine the research questions, this study used the 2015 Korea Community Health Survey and used multi-level analyses. The empirical analyses show that while there are both positive and negative cross-level interaction effects between physical activity-supportive community environment and social capital among individuals on physical activity, the positive cross-level interaction effect is more pronounced for women than for men. These findings suggest that local efforts to improve public health should take into account the cross-level interaction effect between community physical environment and social capital among individuals as well as gender difference.
Highlights
Physical inactivity can be a fundamental cause of various public health problems such as obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and even cancer [1,2,3], a large number of studies have examined why some people are physically active and others are not
We ask two research questions: (1) What is the effect of cross-level interaction between community factors and social capital among individuals on physical activity? (2) Is there gender difference in the effect of the cross-level interaction?
We asked two research questions, (1) What is the effect of cross-level interaction between community factors and social capital among individuals on physical activity? (2) Is there gender difference in the effect of the cross-level interaction? To examine the research questions, we analyzed the 2015 Korea Community Health Survey data and used multi-level analyses
Summary
Physical inactivity can be a fundamental cause of various public health problems such as obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, and even cancer [1,2,3], a large number of studies have examined why some people are physically active and others are not. We focus on the effect of cross-level interaction between community physical environment and social capital among individuals on physical activity and examine gender difference in the cross-level interaction effect. In this regard, we ask two research questions: (1) What is the effect of cross-level interaction between community factors and social capital among individuals on physical activity? Recent studies examine the role of social capital on various health outcomes and find that a greater level of social capital leads to favorable health outcomes [9], such as reduction in mental health illnesses [10,11,12], risk of heart disease [13], and risk of obesity [14,15].
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