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Neighborhood Factors Associated with Physical Activity and Adequacy of Weight Gain During Pregnancy

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Abstract

Healthy diet, physical activity, smoking, and adequate weight gain are all associated with maternal health and fetal growth during pregnancy. Neighborhood characteristics have been associated with poor maternal and child health outcomes, yet conceptualization of potential mechanisms are still needed. Unique information captured by neighborhood inventories, mostly conducted in northern US and Canadian urban areas, has been shown to reveal important aspects of the community environment that are not captured by the demographic quantities in census data. This study used data from the Pregnancy, Nutrition, and Infection (PIN) prospective cohort study to estimate the influences of individual-level and neighborhood-level characteristics on health behaviors and adequacy of weight gain during pregnancy. Women who participated in the PIN study and who resided in Raleigh, North Carolina and its surrounding suburbs were included (n=703). Results from a neighborhood data collection inventory identified three social constructs, physical incivilities, territoriality, and social spaces, which were hypothesized to influence maternal health behaviors. The physical incivility scale was associated with decreased odds (adjusted OR=0.74, 95%CI=0.57, 0.98) in participating in vigorous leisure activity before pregnancy after controlling for several individual confounders, and a crude association for decreased odds of excessive weight gain (OR=0.79, 95%CI=0.64, 0.98). The social spaces scale was associated with decreased odds for inadequate (adjusted OR=0.74, 95%CI=0.56, 0.98) and excessive (adjusted OR=0.69, 95%CI=0.54, 0.98) gestational weight gain. The social spaces scale was also associated with decreased odds of living greater than 3 miles from a supermarket (adjusted OR=0.03, 95%CI=0.00, 0.27). Territoriality was not associated with any pregnancy-related health behavior. None of the neighborhood constructs were associated with smoking or diet quality. Physical incivilities and social spaces neighborhood characteristics may be important to measure to improve our understanding of the potential mechanisms through which neighborhood environments influence health.

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Acknowledgements

We could not have carried out this data collection effort without the greatly appreciated work and assistance given to us by the Carolina Population Center’s Spatial Analysis Unit and by James Terry. We greatly appreciate the cooperation and support of all study staff members, prenatal care providers, and particularly the women who participated in this study. This study was supported by the cooperative agreement ASPH/CDC project S1099-19/21 “Community-level Social Influences on Preterm Birth” and by grants HD28684 and HD28684A from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health; funding from the National Institutes of Health, General Clinical Research Centers program of the Division of Research Resources (grant no. RR00046); cooperative agreements S455/16-17 through the Association of Schools of Public Health/Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and U64/CCU412273 through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; and funds from the Wake Area Health Education Center in Raleigh, North Carolina.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Prevention Sciences, Univeristy of California, San Francisco Center for Health and Community, Campus Box # 0844, 3333 California Street, Suite 465, San Francisco, CA, 94118, USA

    Barbara Laraia, Lynne Messer, Kelly Evenson & Jay S. Kaufman

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  1. Barbara Laraia
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  2. Lynne Messer
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  3. Kelly Evenson
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  4. Jay S. Kaufman
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Correspondence to Barbara Laraia.

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Laraia is with the Division of Prevention Sciences, University of California, Center for Health and Community, San Francisco, CA, USA; Messer is with the Human Studies Division, U.S. EPA/NHEERL, Research Triangle Park, NC, USA; Evenson and Kaufman are with the Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

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Laraia, B., Messer, L., Evenson, K. et al. Neighborhood Factors Associated with Physical Activity and Adequacy of Weight Gain During Pregnancy. J Urban Health 84, 793–806 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-007-9217-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11524-007-9217-z

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