Understanding the Relationship Between Activity and Neighbourhoods (URBAN) Study: Research Design and Methodology

Date
2009
Authors
Badland, HM
Schofield, GM
Witten, K
Schluter, PJ
Mavoa, S
Kearns, RA
Hinckson, EA
Oliver, M
Kaiwai, H
Jensen, VG
Supervisor
Item type
Journal Article
Degree name
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
BioMed Central Ltd.
Abstract

Built environment attributes are recognized as being important contributors to physical activity (PA) engagement and body size in adults and children. However, much of the existing research in this emergent public health field is hindered by methodological limitations, including: population and site homogeneity, reliance on self-report measures, aggregated measures of PA, and inadequate statistical modeling. As an integral component of multi-country collaborative research, the Understanding the Relationship between Activity and Neighbourhoods (URBAN) Study seeks to overcome these limitations by determining the strengths of association between detailed measures of the neighborhood built environment with PA levels across multiple domains and body size measures in adults and children. This article outlines the research protocol developed for the URBAN Study.

Description
Keywords
Adult , Aged , Body size , Child , Child , Preschool , City planning , Cross-sectional studies , Exercise , Female , Humans , Male , Middle aged , New Zealand , Research design , Residence characteristics , Urban population , Young adult
Source
BMC Public Health 2009, 9:224
Rights statement
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.