The role of perceived environment, neighbourhood characteristics, and attitudes in walking behaviour: evidence from a rapidly developing city in China

Eric T H Chan,Tim Schwanen,David Banister

doi:10.1007/s11116-019-10062-2

Abstract

The associations between objective and subjective dimensions of the built environment and walking behaviour have been examined extensively in existing studies. However, the interaction effects of those dimensions of the built environment on walking behaviour are understudied and may be more complex than hitherto suggested. Apart from the subjective dimensions of the built environment, walking attitudes also play a role in moderating these relationships. This paper investigates the independent and joint effects of objective neighbourhood characteristics, people’s perceptions of the neighbourhood environment, and walking attitudes on the frequency of walking by using Shenzhen as a case study. Since those effects may vary across different kinds of walking trips, the analysis looks separately at three major types of walking at the neighbourhood level—walking for work/school, walking for leisure/recreation, and walking for household responsibilities. Logistic regression analyses confirm that the correlates of people’s walking frequency vary considerably among different types of walking. Statistically significant interaction effects of objective neighbourhood characteristics and perceived environment are found. The results suggest that positive perceptions of the environment can compensate for the effect that low objective walkability of neighbourhoods has on people’s walking frequency. When seeking to encouraging walking at the neighbourhood level, policymakers should not only concentrate on improving objective neighbourhood characteristics but also consider people’s perception of the neighbourhood environment and their attitudes towards walking.

Highlights

Physical inactivity is one of the major challenges to global public health (Sallis et al 2016)
This paper examines the association between objective neighbour‐ hood characteristics, perceptions of the neighbourhood environment, walking attitudes, and walking behaviour for three specific types of neighbourhood walking trips
It is noted that most of the current studies tended to treat walking as generic form of travel without fully considering its associations with people’s demand, activities and purposes, which may have oversimplified the relationships between the built environment and walking

Summary

Introduction

Physical inactivity is one of the major challenges to global public health (Sallis et al 2016). The average level of physical activity for adults in China has dropped by nearly 50% from 1991 to 2011 (Zang and Ng 2016), and almost 80% of its adolescents were reported having inadequate exercise (Chen et al 2014). In this context, walking has become a most sustainable form of physical activity in our daily lives, which enables people to interact with the environment in a more direct way due to its slow speed (Kamruzzaman et al 2016; Larrañaga et al 2016). Such interaction effects need to be examined further in a structured manner

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Discussion

Conclusion