The neighborhood an adolescent lives in
may influence his or her development of obesity, new study
findings suggest. Specifically, investigators found that
adolescents from close-knit neighborhoods were less likely
to be obese.
Close-knit neighborhoods exhibited
strong collective efficacy -- neighbors get along and
are willing to help each other, and many adults are role
models for adolescents.
"There is an obesity epidemic in this country and treatment
has focused on diet and exercise with relatively little
success," study author Dr. Deborah A. Cohen, a senior
natural scientist at the Santa Monica, California-based
RAND Corporation, said in a company statement.
The current findings imply that it may be necessary to
"look at the neighborhood environment as potentially very
important in controlling the obesity epidemic," she stated.
"The social environment that a child lives in is very
strongly associated with how active they are, what they
eat and how much they eat," she said.]
Previous studies show that a neighborhood's level of
collective efficacy is predictive of crime, premature
death, death from cardiovascular disease and other health
outcomes. In a survey of 684 households in 65 Los Angeles
County neighborhoods, Cohen and her team investigated
whether collective efficacy may also indirectly affect
factors related to obesity. The study included 807 adolescences
and 3000 adults.
Cohen's group found that adolescents who lived in neighborhoods
with high levels of collective efficacy were also less
likely to be overweight or at risk for overweight and
had a lower body mass index -- a ratio of weight to height
-- than did their peers in other neighborhoods.
Adolescents in low-collective efficacy neighborhoods,
on the other hand, were 64 percent more likely to be at-risk-for-overweight
and 52 percent more likely to be overweight than those
living in neighborhoods with an average level of collective
efficacy, the researchers report in the journal Social
Science & Medicine.
In fact, collective efficacy was more important in predicting
obesity than the ethnic or racial make-up of the neighborhood,
or the income of its residents, Cohen noted.
The reason for the association is unknown, but Cohen
speculated that children in neighborhoods with high collective
efficacy may be more likely to play outside rather than
sit inside and watch television. Or, she said, "maybe
(their) neighborhoods look different," with more parks
and fewer fast food restaurants.
Based on the findings, "we need to start looking at our
environments," she said, and ask: "Are there places for
kids to play? Billboard advertisements for fast foods?"
Citing the potential for neighborhood groups to create
a sports league or get a park for children to play in,
she said, "together people can change their environment
and make it healthy."
SOURCE: Social Science & Medicine, January 2006.
