Effects of Environment on Physical Activity and Nutrition

University of South Carolina: Prevention Research Center

Topics:
Nutrition & Physical Activity for Adults | Nutrition & Physical Activity for Youth

A multidisciplinary team is examining how federal, state, and local policies influence the built environment, which in turn influences residents’ accessibility to places to be active and to purchase fresh fruits and vegetables. The built environment includes manmade physical structures and transportation systems and features such as land use and development, urban design, and visual surroundings. The team is identifying policies; determining how they are established; exploring how they are interpreted, implemented, or modified in practice; and assessing whether they affect planners’ and developers’ decisions. Some of the environmental features being evaluated are street plans, pedestrian crosswalks, school locations, landscaping features, design of food outlets, and the availability of parks and recreation facilities. The researchers are documenting the results for sharing with public health practitioners and researchers.

 

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