UCL Discovery Stage
UCL home » Library Services » Electronic resources » UCL Discovery Stage

The association between dog walking, physical activity and owner's perceptions of safety: cross-sectional evidence from the US and Australia

Christian, H; Wood, L; Nathan, A; Kawachi, I; Houghton, S; Martin, K; McCune, S; (2016) The association between dog walking, physical activity and owner's perceptions of safety: cross-sectional evidence from the US and Australia. BMC Public Health , 16 , Article 1010. 10.1186/s12889-016-3659-8. Green open access

[thumbnail of Published article]
Preview
Text (Published article)
The association between dog.pdf - Published Version

Download (597kB) | Preview
[thumbnail of Supplementary table]
Preview
Text (Supplementary table)
Christian_Association_dog_walking_Suppl.pdf

Download (190kB) | Preview

Abstract

BACKGROUND: We examined the relationship between dog walking and physical activity within and between four US cities and Australia and investigated if dog walking is associated with higher perceived safety in US and Australian cities. METHODS: Dog owners (n = 1113) in the Pet Connections Study completed a cross-sectional survey. Data were collected across four study sites; three in the US (San Diego, Nashville, Portland) and a fourth in Australia (Perth). Physical activity, local walking, dog walking, and individual and community perceptions of safety were analysed for dog walkers and non-dog walkers for each study site. Between-city comparisons were examined for dog walkers. RESULTS: Across all study sites, dog walkers walked with their dog 5–6 times/week for a total of 93–109 min/week and achieved ≥30mins of physical activity on more days/week and walked in their neighbourhood more often/week, compared with non-dog walkers (all p ≤ 0.01). Compared with Perth, significantly fewer dog walkers walked in their local park in the three US study sites. San Diego dog walkers walked more often in their neighborhood/week compared with Perth dog walkers (all p ≤ 0.05). In Portland, dog walkers perceived significantly more neighborhood problems and in Nashville dog walkers perceived a significantly higher level of neighborhood natural surveillance (i.e., ‘eyes on the street’), compared with non-dog walkers (both p ≤ 0.05). Among dog walkers, females were more likely than males to feel safer walking with their dog in their neighborhood (OR = 2.49; 95 % CI = 1.76, 3.53). Compared with dog walkers in Perth, dog walkers from each of the US study sites felt safer in their neighborhood and perceived there was more neighborhood surveillance (all p ≤ 0.001). CONCLUSION: This multi-site international study provides further support for the potential for dog walking to increase levels of daily physical activity. Walking with a dog may be a mechanism for increasing perceptions of neighborhood safety and getting to know the neighborhood, however significant between-country differences exist. Further international research is required to understand the drivers for these between-country differences. Community based programs and policies aimed at improving safety and social connectedness should consider the wider community benefits of dog walking and include strategies for supporting more dog walking.

Type: Article
Title: The association between dog walking, physical activity and owner's perceptions of safety: cross-sectional evidence from the US and Australia
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1186/s12889-016-3659-8
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-016-3659-8
Language: English
Additional information: Copyright © The Author(s) 2016. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
Keywords: Dog, Physical activity, Walking, International, Neighborhood, Safety, Community
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10027964
Downloads since deposit
4,860Downloads
Download activity - last month
Download activity - last 12 months
Downloads by country - last 12 months

Archive Staff Only

View Item View Item