Research Center for Disaster Mitigation of Urban Cultural Heritage, Ritsumeikan University, 58 Komatsubara Kitamachi, Kita-ku, Kyoto, Kyoto, 603-8341 Japan.
BMC Public Health. 2011 Aug 19;11:657. doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-11-657.
Although many studies have reported the association between neighborhood built environment (BE) and physical activity (PA), less is known about the associations for older populations or in countries besides the US and Australia. The aim of this paper is to examine the associations for older adult populations in Japan.
Our analyses were based on cross-sectional data from the Aichi Gerontological Evaluation Study (AGES), conducted in 2003. The respondents were older adults, aged 65 years or over (n = 9,414), from 8 municipalities across urban, suburban, and rural areas. The frequency of leisure time sports activity and total walking time were used as the outcome variables. Using geographic information systems (GIS), we measured residential density, street connectivity, number of local destinations, access to recreational spaces, and land slope of the respondents' neighborhoods, based on network distances with multiple radii (250 m, 500 m, 1,000 m). An ordinal logistic regression model was used to analyze the association between PA and BE measures.
Population density and presence of parks or green spaces had positive associations with the frequency of sports activity, regardless of the selected buffer zone. The analysis of total walking time, however, showed only a few associations.
Our findings provide mixed support for the association between PA and the characteristics of BE measures, previously used in Western settings. Some characteristics of the neighborhood built environment may facilitate leisure time sports activity, but not increase the total walking time for Japanese older adults.
尽管许多研究报告了邻里建成环境（BE）与身体活动（PA）之间的关联，但对于老年人或美国和澳大利亚以外的国家的关联知之甚少。本文旨在探讨日本老年人群体的关联。
我们的分析基于 2003 年在爱知县老年评估研究（AGES）中进行的横断面数据。受访者为年龄在 65 岁及以上的老年人（n=9414），来自城市、郊区和农村的 8 个市。休闲时间体育活动的频率和总步行时间用作因变量。使用地理信息系统（GIS），我们根据具有多个半径的网络距离（250m、500m、1000m），测量了受访者社区的居住密度、街道连通性、当地目的地数量、娱乐空间可达性和土地坡度。使用有序逻辑回归模型分析 PA 和 BE 测量值之间的关联。
人口密度和公园或绿地的存在与体育活动的频率呈正相关，与所选缓冲区无关。然而，对总步行时间的分析仅显示出一些关联。
我们的研究结果为 PA 与以前在西方环境中使用的 BE 措施特征之间的关联提供了混合支持。邻里建成环境的某些特征可能有利于休闲时间的体育活动，但不会增加日本老年人的总步行时间。
