Towards an understanding of salient neighborhood boundaries: adolescent reports of an easy walking distance and convenie
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BioMed Central
Open Access
Short paper
Towards an understanding of salient neighborhood boundaries: adolescent reports of an easy walking distance and convenient driving distance Natalie Colabianchi*1, Marsha Dowda2, Karin A Pfeiffer3, Dwayne E Porter4, Maria João CA Almeida5 and Russell R Pate2 Address: 1Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, University of South Carolina, 921 Assembly Street, Columbia, SC 29208, USA, 2Department of Exercise Science, University of South Carolina, 921 Assembly Street, Columbia, SC 29208, USA, 3Department of Kinesiology, Michigan State University, Room 3 IM Sports Circle, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA, 4Department of Environmental Health Sciences, University of South Carolina, 921 Assembly Street, Columbia, SC 29208, USA and 5Department of Physical Education and Sports, University of Madeira, 9000390 Funchal, Madeira, Portugal Email: Natalie Colabianchi* - [email protected]; Marsha Dowda - [email protected]; Karin A Pfeiffer - [email protected]; Dwayne E Porter - [email protected]; Maria João CA Almeida - [email protected]; Russell R Pate - [email protected] * Corresponding author
Published: 18 December 2007 International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity 2007, 4:66 5868-4-66
doi:10.1186/1479-
Received: 19 September 2007 Accepted: 18 December 2007
This article is available from: http://www.ijbnpa.org/content/4/1/66 © 2007 Colabianchi et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 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.
Abstract Numerous studies have examined the association between the surrounding neighborhood environment and physical activity levels in adolescents. Many of these studies use a road network buffer or Euclidean distance buffer around an adolescent's home to represent the appropriate geographic area for study (i.e., neighborhood). However, little empirical research has examined the appropriate buffer size to use when defining this area and there is little consistency across published research as to the buffer size used. In this study, 909 12th grade adolescent girls of diverse racial and geographic backgrounds were asked to report their perceptions of an easy walking distance and a convenient driving distance. These two criterions are often used as the basis for defining one's neighborhood. The mean easy walking distance in minutes reported by adolescent girls was 14.8 minutes (SD = 8.7). The mean convenient driving distance in minutes reported was 17.9 minutes (SD = 10.8). Nested linear multivariate regression models found significant differences in reported 'easy walking distance' across race and BMI. White adolescents reported on average almost 2 minutes longer for an easy walking distance compared to African American adolescents. Adolescents who were not overweight or at risk for overweight reported almost 2 minutes fewer for a
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