Neighborhood Self-Selection: The Role of Pre-Move Health Factors on the Built and Socioeconomic Environment
View/ Open
Author
Subramanian, S.V.
Published Version
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph121012489Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
James, Peter, Jaime E. Hart, Mariana C. Arcaya, Diane Feskanich, Francine Laden, and S.V. Subramanian. 2015. “Neighborhood Self-Selection: The Role of Pre-Move Health Factors on the Built and Socioeconomic Environment.” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 12 (10): 12489-12504. doi:10.3390/ijerph121012489. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph121012489.Abstract
Residential self-selection bias is a concern in studies of neighborhoods and health. This bias results from health behaviors predicting neighborhood choice. To quantify this bias, we examined associations between pre-move health factors (body mass index, walking, and total physical activity) and post-move neighborhood factors (County Sprawl Index, Census tract socioeconomic status (SES)) in the Nurses’ Health Study (n = 14,159 moves from 1986–2008). Individuals in the highest quartile of pre-move BMI (BMI > 28.4) compared to the lowest quartile (BMI < 22.5) moved to counties that averaged 2.57 points lower on the sprawl index (95% confidence interval −3.55, −1.59) indicating that individuals moved to less dense counties; however, no associations were observed for pre-move walking nor total physical activity. Individuals with higher pre-move BMI tended to move to Census tracts with lower median income and home values and higher levels of poverty. Analyses examining the change in neighborhood environments after a move demonstrated that healthy pre-move behaviors were associated with moves to worse socioeconomic environments. This type of self-selection would bias results downward, underestimating the true relationship between SES and physical activity. Generally, the magnitudes of associations between pre-move health factors and neighborhood measures were small and indicated that residential self-selection was not a major source of bias in analyses in this population.Other Sources
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4626981/pdf/Terms of Use
This article is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of-use#LAACitable link to this page
http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:23845358
Collections
- HMS Scholarly Articles [17917]
- SPH Scholarly Articles [6362]
Contact administrator regarding this item (to report mistakes or request changes)