The effects of meteorological conditions and daylight on nature-based recreational physical activity in England

Lewis R Elliott,Mathew P White,Christophe Sarran,James Grellier,Joanne K Garrett,Enrico Scoccimarro,Alexander J Smalley,Lora E Fleming

doi:10.1016/j.ufug.2019.05.005

Abstract

Meteorological conditions affect people’s outdoor physical activity. However, we know of no previous research into how these conditions affect physical activity in different types of natural environments – key settings for recreational physical activity, but ones which are particularly impacted by meteorological conditions.Using responses from four waves (2009–2013) of a survey of leisure visits to natural environments in England (n = 47,613), visit dates and locations were ascribed estimates of energy expenditure (MET-minutes) and assigned meteorological data. We explored relationships between MET-minutes in natural environments (in particular, parks, woodlands, inland waters, and coasts) and the hourly maxima of air temperature and wind speed, levels of rainfall, and daylight hours using generalised additive models.Overall, we found a positive linear relationship between MET-minutes and air temperature; a negative linear relationship with wind speed; no relation with categories of rainfall; and a positive, but non-linear relationship with daylight hours. These same trends were observed for park-based energy expenditure, but differed for visits to other natural environments: only daylight hours were related to energy expenditure at woodlands; wind speed and daylight hours affected energy expenditure at inland waters; and only air temperature was related to energy expenditure at coasts.Natural environments support recreational physical activity under a range of meteorological conditions. However, distinct conditions do differentially affect the amount of energy expenditure accumulated in a range of natural environments. The findings have implications for reducing commonly-reported meteorological barriers to both recreational physical activity and visiting natural environments for leisure, and begin to indicate how recreational energy expenditure in these environments could be affected by future climate change.

Highlights

Many adults worldwide do not achieve recommended levels of physical activity (Hallal et al, 2012), potentially undermining physical and mental health
The following types of visit were excluded as metabolic equivalent of task (MET)-minutes could not be reliably calculated for them: (i) visits where "any other outdoor activity" or "none of these activities" were reported (n = 2689); (ii) visits which involved more than one activity (n = 11,182); (iii) visits without complete meteorological data (n = 588); and (iv) visits with duration < 1 min (n = 14)
Using a large sample of recreational visits in England, this study found that higher air temperatures, lower wind speeds, and more daylight hours were associated with greater energy expenditure in all types of natural environment

Summary

Introduction

Many adults worldwide do not achieve recommended levels of physical activity (Hallal et al, 2012), potentially undermining physical and mental health A Canadian study found clement (vs inclement) meteorological conditions were associated with an additional 2000 steps per day with mean daily temperatures, total daily rainfall, and maximum wind speeds playing a role (Chan et al, 2006). Seasonal effects such as daylight hours, have been associated with physical activity. A study of older English adults found that each quartile of daylight hours was associated with significantly more minutes of daily physical activity than the preceding quartile (Wu et al, 2017b)

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Conclusion