Relationships between Characteristics of Urban Green Land Cover and Mental Health in U.S. Metropolitan Areas
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Methods
2.1. Study Area
2.2. Mental Health
2.3. Land Cover
2.4. Confounding Variables
2.5. Statistical Analysis
3. Results
4. Discussion
Acknowledgments
Author Contributions
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Variable | Description |
---|---|
Percent Land Cover | The proportional abundance of vegetative cover in the defined area (e.g., county). |
Patch Area | Mean of the total area of vegetative patches. |
Patch Density | The number of vegetative patches per 100 hectares. |
Edge Density | The total length of all vegetative edge segments per hectare. |
Edge Contrast Index | The total length of segments between vegetative cover and developed area divided by the total perimeter of all the patches. |
Euclidean Distance | Mean distance to the nearest neighbor patch with the same vegetative type (based on shortest edge-to-edge distance). |
Patch Cohesion Index | The physical connectedness of vegetative cover. The value increases as the patch type becomes more physically connected. |
Variables | Mean | SD |
---|---|---|
Frequent mental distress | 10.76 | 2.0 |
Forest | 0.31 | 22.29 |
Patch area | 8594.68 | 24,802 |
Patch density | 1.54 | 0.9 |
Edge density | 49.62 | 26.14 |
Edge contrast index | 27.19 | 20.78 |
Euclidean distance | 143.94 | 155.27 |
Patch cohesion index | 96.58 | 4.98 |
Shrubland | 5.94 | 13.04 |
Patch area (ha) | 10,680.60 | 78,921.10 |
Patch density | 1.18 | 1.22 |
Edge density | 16.86 | 24.44 |
Edge contrast index | 12.36 | 11.10 |
Euclidean distance | 803.69 | 2058.48 |
Patch cohesion index | 81.2 | 10.25 |
Herbaceous | 6.66 | 11.95 |
Patch area (ha) | 1254.51 | 10,091.60 |
Patch density | 1.36 | 1.14 |
Edge density | 18.63 | 20.73 |
Edge contrast index | 17.84 | 10.9 |
Euclidean distance | 328.89 | 448.87 |
Patch cohesion index | 85.94 | 7.45 |
Potential Confounders | ||
Population density | 402,639 | 823,130 |
Housing density | 165,658 | 313,323 |
Median HH income | 57,410 USD | 13,336.70 USD |
Race (% non-white population) | 27.7 | 19.39 |
Region | N (Counties) | Mean | SD |
---|---|---|---|
Southwest | 40 | 9.5 a | 1.1 |
West | 35 | 9.8 a | 1.2 |
Northeast | 34 | 10.5 a,b | 1.2 |
Midwest | 61 | 10.6 b,c | 1.2 |
Southeast | 106 | 11.7 d | 1.4 |
Landscape Metric | rho | p-Value |
---|---|---|
Forest | 0.18 | 0.003 |
Patch area | 0.17 | 0.005 |
Patch density | −0.14 | 0.017 |
Edge density | 0.11 | 0.059 |
Edge contrast index | 0.05 | 0.386 |
Euclidean distance | −0.18 | 0.003 |
Patch cohesion index | 0.17 | 0.004 |
Shrubland | −0.16 | 0.007 |
Patch area | −0.10 | 0.094 |
Patch density | −0.17 | 0.005 |
Edge density | −0.17 | 0.004 |
Edge contrast index | −0.08 | 0.188 |
Euclidean distance | 0.19 | 0.001 |
Patch cohesion index | −0.08 | 0.175 |
Herbaceous | −0.14 | 0.019 |
Patch area | −0.11 | 0.070 |
Patch density | −0.03 | 0.670 |
Edge density | −0.14 | 0.025 |
Edge contrast index | −0.09 | 0.123 |
Euclidean distance | 0.11 | 0.067 |
Patch cohesion index | −0.13 | 0.027 |
Potential Confounders | ||
Population density | −0.08 | 0.214 |
Housing density | −0.07 | 0.251 |
Median Household Income | −0.12 | 0.042 |
Race (% non-white population) | −0.14 | 0.016 |
Adjusted Odds Ratio | 95% CI | 95% CI | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Lower CI | Lower CI | ||||
(Intercept) | 0.0016 | ** | 0.0000 | 0.0000 | |
%Forest | 1.0132 | 0.9917 | 0.9917 | ||
Forest-Edge contrast index | 0.9619 | ** | 0.9371 | 0.9371 | |
Shrubland-Patch area | 1.0000 | 1.0000 | 1.0000 | ||
Shrubland-Edge contrast index | 1.0068 | 0.9595 | 0.9595 | ||
Shrubland-Euclidean distance | 1.0027 | *** | 1.0016 | 1.0016 | |
Shrubland-Cohesion index | 1.0751 | ** | 1.0194 | 1.0194 | |
%Herbaceous | 0.9957 | 0.9347 | 0.9347 | ||
Herbaceous-Patch density | 1.2880 | 0.8612 | 0.8612 | ||
Ecoregion | Midwest | Referent | |||
Northeast | 1.0288 | 0.3255 | 3.2753 | ||
Southeast | 1.9631 | 0.6698 | 5.8683 | ||
Southwest | 0.0088 | *** | 0.0009 | 0.0666 | |
West | 0.0453 | ** | 0.0053 | 0.3155 | |
Population Density | DL | ||||
Housing Density | 0.9990 | 0.9965 | 1.0014 | ||
Median Household Income | 1.0000 | 1.0000 | 1.0000 | ||
%Non-White | 1.0330 | * | 1.0063 | 1.0623 |
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Tsai, W.-L.; McHale, M.R.; Jennings, V.; Marquet, O.; Hipp, J.A.; Leung, Y.-F.; Floyd, M.F. Relationships between Characteristics of Urban Green Land Cover and Mental Health in U.S. Metropolitan Areas. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2018, 15, 340. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15020340
Tsai W-L, McHale MR, Jennings V, Marquet O, Hipp JA, Leung Y-F, Floyd MF. Relationships between Characteristics of Urban Green Land Cover and Mental Health in U.S. Metropolitan Areas. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2018; 15(2):340. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15020340
Chicago/Turabian StyleTsai, Wei-Lun, Melissa R. McHale, Viniece Jennings, Oriol Marquet, J. Aaron Hipp, Yu-Fai Leung, and Myron F. Floyd. 2018. "Relationships between Characteristics of Urban Green Land Cover and Mental Health in U.S. Metropolitan Areas" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 15, no. 2: 340. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15020340
APA StyleTsai, W. -L., McHale, M. R., Jennings, V., Marquet, O., Hipp, J. A., Leung, Y. -F., & Floyd, M. F. (2018). Relationships between Characteristics of Urban Green Land Cover and Mental Health in U.S. Metropolitan Areas. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(2), 340. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15020340