Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Yale School of Public Health, 60 College St., New Haven, CT, 06510, USA.
Department of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, University of Washington School of Public Health, 3980 15th Ave NE, Seattle, WA, 98195, USA.
J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol. 2024 May;34(3):512-517. doi: 10.1038/s41370-023-00637-8. Epub 2024 Mar 6.
Self-reported distances to industrial sources have been used in epidemiology as proxies for exposure to environmental hazards and indicators of awareness and perception of sources. Unconventional oil and gas development (UOG) emits pollutants and has been associated with adverse health outcomes. We compared self-reported distance to the nearest UOG well to the geographic information system-calculated distance for 303 Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia residents using Cohen's Weighted Kappa. Agreement was low (Kappa = 0.18), and self-reports by Ohioans (39% accuracy) were more accurate than West Virginians (22%) or Pennsylvanians (13%, both p < 0.05). Of the demographic characteristics studied, only educational attainment was related to reporting accuracy; residents with 12-16 years of education were more accurate (31.3% of group) than those with <12 or >16 years (both 16.7%). Understanding differences between objective and subjective measures of UOG proximity could inform studies of perceived exposures or risks and may also be relevant to adverse health effects. IMPACT: We compared objective and self-reported measures of distance to the nearest UOG well for 303 Appalachian Basin residents. We found that residents' self-reported distance to the nearest UOG well had limited agreement with the true calculated distance category. Our results can be used to inform the collection and contextualize the use of self-reported data in communities exposed to UOGD. Self-reported metrics can be used in conjunction with objective assessments and can be informative regarding how potentially exposed populations perceive environmental exposures or risks and could provide insights into awareness of distance-related policies, such as setbacks.
自我报告的与工业源的距离曾被用于流行病学中，作为暴露于环境危害的替代指标，以及对污染源的认识和感知的指标。非常规石油和天然气开发（UOG）会排放污染物，并与不良健康结果有关。我们比较了宾夕法尼亚州、俄亥俄州和西弗吉尼亚州 303 名居民自我报告的最近 UOG 井的距离与地理信息系统计算的距离，使用 Cohen 的加权 Kappa 进行评估。一致性较低（Kappa=0.18），俄亥俄州居民（准确率为 39%）的自我报告比西弗吉尼亚州居民（准确率为 22%）或宾夕法尼亚州居民（准确率为 13%）更准确（均 p<0.05）。在所研究的人口统计学特征中，只有受教育程度与报告准确性有关；接受过 12-16 年教育的居民（准确率为 31.3%）比受教育程度低于 12 年或高于 16 年的居民（准确率均为 16.7%）更准确。了解 UOG 接近程度的客观和主观测量之间的差异可以为感知暴露或风险的研究提供信息，也可能与不良健康影响有关。影响：我们比较了阿巴拉契亚盆地 303 名居民对最近 UOG 井的客观和自我报告的距离测量。我们发现，居民自我报告的距离与真实计算的距离类别之间的一致性有限。我们的研究结果可用于指导 UOGD 暴露社区的自我报告数据的收集和使用，并可说明自我报告的数据在多大程度上可以反映潜在暴露人群对环境暴露或风险的感知，还可以深入了解人们对与距离相关的政策（如后退距离）的认识。自我报告的指标可以与客观评估结合使用，并且可以提供有关潜在受影响人群对距离相关政策的认识的信息。
