ArticleCanadian journal of public health = Revue canadienne de sante publique2012
Linking childhood obesity to the built environment: a multi-level analysis of home and school neighbourhood factors associated with body mass index.
Article in Canadian journal of public health = Revue canadienne de sante publique, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 42 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
42 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Food environment research in Canada: a rapid review of methodologies and measures deployed between 2010 and 2021.The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity · 2024Pooled it
- Association between access to convenience stores and childhood obesity: A systematic review.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2021Pooled it
- State-of-the-art of measures of the obesogenic environment for children.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2021Pooled it
- Fast-food restaurant, unhealthy eating, and childhood obesity: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity · 2021Pooled it
- Neighbourhood retail food outlet access, diet and body mass index in Canada: a systematic review.Health promotion and chronic disease prevention in Canada : research, policy and practice · 2019Pooled it
- The relationship of the local food environment with obesity: A systematic review of methods, study quality, and results.Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) · 2015Pooled it
- Disparities of children's obesogenic environments in Louisiana.International journal of health geographics · 2026Article
- Food Environment Around Schools in a Capital City in Southern Brazil: Changes in the Availability of Commercial Food Establishments Between 2012 and 2019.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Article
- Association between obesogenic environments and childhood overweight/obesity across the United States: Differences by rurality.The Journal of rural health : official journal of the American Rural Health Association and the National Rural Health Care Association · 2025Article
- Shaping childhood obesity: behavioral and environmental risk factors associated with body mass index trajectories between 2 and 9 years in Samoan children.International journal of obesity (2005) · 2025Article
- Built environment and childhood obesity.World journal of clinical pediatrics · 2024Review
- A value chain to improve human, animal and insect health in developing countries.Microbiome research reports · 2024Article
- Characteristics of the obesogenic environment around schools are associated with body fat and low-grade inflammation in Brazilian children.Public health nutrition · 2023Article
- Early childhood eating behaviors associated with risk of overweight and its socio-ecological determinants in Korean preschool children.Nutrition research and practice · 2023Article
- Mapping the Way to Good Health: The Interdisciplinary Challenges of Geographers in Medical Research.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Article
- Measuring the Built Environment in Studies of Child Health-A Meta-Narrative Review of Associations.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Review
- The Relationship of Urban Form on Children and Adolescent Health Outcomes: A Scoping Review of Canadian Evidence.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Multilevel analysis of factors that influence overweight in children: research in schools enrolled in northern Brazil School Health Program.BMC pediatrics · 2020Article
- Exploring Student Food Behaviour in Relation to Food Retail over the Time of Implementing Ontario's School Food and Beverage Policy.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesThis study examines environmental factors associated with BMI (body mass index) levels among adolescents with the aim of identifying potential interventions for reducing childhood obesity.
methodsStudents (n=1,048) aged 10-14 years at 28 schools in London, ON, completed a survey providing information on age, sex, height, weight, home address, etc., which was used to construct age-sex adjusted BMI z-scores. The presence of recreation opportunities, fast-food outlets and convenience stores was assessed using four areal units around each participant's home and school neighbourhood: "circular buffers" encompassing territory within a straight-line distance of 500 m and 1000 m; and "network buffers" of 500 m and 1000 m measured along the street network. School neighbourhoods were also assessed using school-specific "walksheds". Multilevel structural equation modeling techniques were employed to simultaneously test the effects of school-environment (Level 2) and home-environment (Level 1) predictors on BMI z-scores.
resultsMost participants (71%) had a normal BMI, 16.9% were overweight, 7.6% were obese, and 4.6% were considered underweight. Multilevel analyses indicated that built environment characteristics around children's homes and schools had a modest but significant effect on their BMI. The presence of public recreation opportunities within a 500 m network distance of home was associated with lower BMI z-scores (p<0.05), and fast-food outlets within the school walkshed was associated with higher BMI z-scores (p<0.05).
conclusionInterventions and policies that improve children's access to publicly provided recreation opportunities near home and that mitigate the concentration of fast-food outlets close to schools may be key to promoting healthy lifestyles and reducing childhood obesity.
Indexed as
Identifiers
23618083PMC6973850What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.