The Relationship between Neighborhood Environment and Child Mental Health in Japanese Elementary School Students.

Rikuya Hosokawa,Toshiki Katsura

doi:10.3390/ijerph17155491

Abstract

Limited research has examined the relationship between neighborhood environment and mental health outcomes in elementary school students (middle childhood). In countries with high relative poverty, little is known about how neighborhood conditions are related to children’s health after controlling for family socioeconomic status; thus, it is necessary to distinguish the particular neighborhood characteristics relevant to behavioral risk in children, independent of socioeconomic position. Using a self-report survey completed by parents, we assessed neighborhood environment characteristics, children’s behavioral outcomes, and family socioeconomic status in fourth grade students from Nagoya, in Aichi prefecture, Japan (n = 695). A multiple linear regression was conducted to evaluate to what extent neighborhood characteristics predict child behaviors, after adjusting for socioeconomic variables. Greater aesthetic quality, walkability, accessibility of healthy foods, safety, and social cohesion were inversely linked to children’s behavioral problems and positively linked to social competence, suggesting that quality of living environment may affect behavioral outcomes in children, even after controlling for socioeconomic factors. Developing a quality environment that matches these characteristics may minimize the negative impact of a family’s socioeconomic distress and is likely to aid socioeconomically disadvantaged parents and their children. Thus, policies and programs that enhance the neighborhood environment for socioeconomically disadvantaged families should be promoted.

Highlights

There is considerable evidence that neighborhood conditions affect a range of child developmental outcomes [1,2,3], including the well-being and behavior of developing children
Even after adjusting for the impact of family disadvantage at an individual level, specific neighborhood features were likely to impact behavioral outcomes in middle childhood. These findings suggest that the features of one’s living neighborhood environment are associated with child mental health, independent of individual family socioeconomic factors
After adjusting for family socioeconomic variables, neighborhood characteristics were significantly associated with child behavior

Summary

Introduction

There is considerable evidence that neighborhood conditions affect a range of child developmental outcomes [1,2,3], including the well-being and behavior of developing children. While most studies have focused on relationships between the neighborhood environment and children’s behavioral outcomes in early childhood [5,6,7], less research has been devoted to these relationships in elementary school-aged children (middle childhood). Age is important in the context of child development, as there are various theoretical childhood stages that can cause children to be sensitive to their surroundings [8]. Early childhood represents a very sensitive period of development in terms of the various child-rearing environmental factors surrounding children [9]. From the life-course perspective, ecological embeddedness intensifies with age, as children grow increasingly independent from their families [8]

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Conclusion