Association of built-environment, social-environment and personal factors with bicycling as a mode of transportation among Austrian city dwellers
Introduction
Physical activity of moderate intensity has been clearly shown to provide significant health benefits (e.g. Haskell, 2004). The results of a European survey (Sjöström et al., 2006) indicated that two thirds of adult populations in European countries are not sufficiently active to gain optimal health benefits. Health-enhancing physical activity includes the concept of accumulating physical activity throughout the day. Studies comparing short intermittent activity versus continuous bouts of activity (Andersen et al., 1999, Macfarlane et al., 2006, Murphy and Hardman, 1998) have shown that accumulating multiple short bouts of moderate-intensity physical activity significantly improved the fitness of sedentary adults, to a similar extent as did a single continuous bout of equal total duration. In addition, the concept of accumulating several short bouts of physical activity every day may improve adherence to regular physical activity because it seems to be easier to include multiple bouts into everyday life compared to a longer continuous bout (Murphy 2004).
In the European Union member countries, on average 50% of all car trips are shorter than 5 km. These distances can be easily covered by bicycle (Hydén et al., 1998). As bicycle trips for commuting purposes are typically return trips, such accumulated relatively short bouts of daily physical activity may well serve as a feasible strategy to attain regular health-enhancing physical activity among a considerable part of urban populations.
Ecological models specify that physical environments, social-environments, and personal-level attributes may influence health behavior (Sallis and Owen, 2002). Ecological models are used to explain the complex array of factors that influence physical activity, resulting in greater emphasis on environmental correlates. Furthermore, behavior-specific and context-specific ecological models are believed to be important. The assumption is that behavior can be better predicted when there is greater correspondence between a specific behavior outcome measure and the specific environmental and personal variables hypothesized to be associated with that behavior (Giles-Corti et al., 2005).
Studies investigating environmental correlates of bicycling for transportation are rather scarce. Combinations of walking and bicycling (De Bourdeaudhuij et al., 2005, Van Lenthe et al., 2005, Timperio et al., 2006) or the use of bicycling for transportation and recreation (Cervero and Duncan, 2003, Moudon et al., 2005) have been more extensively investigated.
In addition, the results of commuter cycling studies are diverse because the assessed environmental attributes have varied considerably across the studies. In an Australian study (Carver et al., 2005) it was found that boys' perception of peers in their neighborhood and parents' perception of good sports facilities in the neighborhood were positively related with the children's use of cycling for transport. Sisson et al. (2006) developed a bikeability score out of seven environmental factors to assess the cycling environment for 14 elementary schools in the U.S. The prevalence of cycling was assessed by counting the bicycles on the school racks. The correlation between the bikeability score and cycling was low and non-significant. In a Dutch study, a positive relationship was found between the square area of sport grounds and parks, and cycling for transport among city dwellers (Wendel-Vos et al., 2004). In an Austrian study among university students, an unexpected relationship was found. Those who perceived high traffic safety along their path were less likely to cycle regularly. In addition, safety from bicycle theft was positively correlated with regular cycling (Titze et al., 2007).
The aim of the present study was to determine the association between context-specific built-environment, social-environment, and personal-level factors on the one hand, and bicycling for transportation on the other, within a representative sample of adults in a mid-sized Austrian city.
Section snippets
Procedure
A cross-sectional survey of adults aged 15–60 years was conducted between September and October 2005. Self-reported data were obtained by means of computer-assisted telephone interviews (CATI). The protocol was approved by the ethics committee of the local medical university (No.17-083ex05/06).
Participants
A basic sample of telephone numbers was taken from the telephone directory of the city of Graz. Subjects were randomly called on the basis of the last digit of their landline and mobile telephone numbers.
Accessed destination and the use of bicycles as a means of transportation
The most frequently accessed destinations during the past seven days were the place of work (46.5%), the grocery shop (17.4%), the place of education (11.7%), other shops/services (4.3%), kindergarten/children's schools (4.1%), cafés/restaurants (2.1%) the railway station (1.8%), and other destinations (11.8%). The subjects needed on average 16 min (SD = 11 min) to reach their destination. Close to a quarter of the subjects (23.6%) used bicycles. The average cycling distance was 3.2 km (SD =
Discussion
The unique aspect of our study is that we assessed the physical environment along the used route of bicycling together with cycling-specific social support/modeling, and the perceived benefits and barriers in order to increase the specificity of the correlates. For example, we assessed the “attractiveness of cycling conditions” instead of “attractiveness in general”. Similarly, the factor “land-use mix diversity of uses” describes the variety of buildings along the route instead of the number
Acknowledgment
Funding for this study was provided by the Austrian Health Promotion Foundation – a division of Gesundheit Österreich GmbH – and the Municipality of Graz (Traffic Planning and Culture).
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