Park life
Is there a link between proximity to parks and ageing? Plus how parks promote activity and social interaction but perhaps not for everyone.
“reform the working classes from their brutish and debasing pleasures to an appreciation of the arts and nature.”
In the early 19th Century Joseph Strutt, a wealthy industrialist and land-owner provided the working class residents of the industrial English city of Derby with a number of philanthropic initiatives which, as he expressed rather bluntly, would be of great benefit to them. One of his projects was the creation of the first public park in Britain, which he commissioned the horticulturist, writer and landscape designer John Claudius Loudon to build. The resulting park, Derby Arboretum, was formally opened in 1840 and built on land Strutt donated to the city. Loudon had earlier created the term arboretum, to define a garden within which there was a collection of trees that were used for scientific and educational purposes as well as for pleasure, which informed the layout of the new park. Until 1882 there was a charge to access the park, although to support the working class access had been free on Wednesdays and Sundays.
Public parks play a key role in providing green spaces within urban settings, with lots of research linking the access to such greenspaces with multiple benefits, ranging from individual health benefits to supporting social cohesion and community. Parks will be the focus of the next couple of Compassionate Nature articles, with this article mainly focused on a health aspect that has been explored in relation to them - ageing.
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During 2023 a number of studies lead to media headlines claiming that living near greenspaces such as parks reduced the aging process - or as this media report headlines says “can add 2.5 years to your life”. Is that really true?
One of the studies the media reported on was Kyeezu Kim and colleagues (2023) analysis that suggested that greater green space access correlated with lower biological age as measured by changes in DNA methylation. This was based on a sample of over 900 adults in 4 US cities using data from 1986 to 2006. A few months later a paper by Scott Ogletree and colleagues was published which also lead to similar headlines. That analysis was based on data extracted from a US national health survey, using biological samples taken from 7,827 adult participants during 1999 to 2001 and looked at the length of telomeres, part of DNA, which become shorter each time a cell divides. This may be used as a biomarker of cellular age, with the results suggesting those with greater access to local greenspace had longer telomere length than those with less access. These findings sound promising given they appear to demonstrate a measurable physiological benefit from proximity to greenspaces. And who wouldn’t want to age a little less quickly?
But, and you probably expected there was a but coming, the authors of both studies highlight key limitations to their analyses. Both studies are correlational and used the relationship between the biomarkers to the proximity of greenspace based on a main residential location. While some individual characteristics were factored in, other reasons cannot be ruled out, for example participants diet, levels of stress, support and social network. Neither study looked in detail at the type of greenspace and if different types provided different benefits. The telomere study found the results only significant in men.
So we have to be really cautious around the interpretation of the link between ageing as measured by these biomarkers and proximity to greenspaces. However given the increasing ageing populations across many countries coupled with increasing levels of urbanisation and in some cases increasing sedentary lives, access to greenspaces like parks is an important health consideration. Two recent psychological research papers may add to the discussion by considering proximity and usage of public parks by older adults.
Getting active
Monica Motomura and colleges 2024 paper looked at levels of active behaviours and proximity to parks of individuals in a large Japanese city, informed by a number of Western based studies which suggested proximity to parks acted as an encouraging influence on activity levels. The study was conducted in Matsudo City, a densely populated city within which 26% of adults are aged 65 years or older. It also has a large number of parks, 221, ranging from small to medium sized. The participants were aged 65 to 84, mean age 74 and were mainly male (63%). They were also predominantly married (83%) and nearly all had at least one chronic health condition, with just under a quarter measuring highly for depression on a self-report scale. Across a week the participants wore an accelerometer which measured their activity intensity, with the data captured from those who wore it for over 10 hours per day over at least 4 of the days. Proximity to a park was measured within 800 to 1600 meters. The analysis revealed that there appeared to be a relationship between proximity and more breaks from sedentary behaviour, but it did not find significant increases in activity levels. It is a cross-sectional study, so no casual link can be established between the park proximity and sedentary behaviour. The city chosen for the study has a lot of accessible parks, so a future study could look at areas where there are varying degrees of accessibility. The study did not record the activities that participants undertook nor did it consider the quality and characteristics of the parks. So the results hint that being close to parks may result in less sedentary time for older people, which may not result though in greater levels of physical activity.
Getting social
China is one of the countries experiencing a rapid increase in an ageing population. Some studies have suggested this often leads to social isolation amongst older adults, with 63% of elderly citizens reported as experiencing loneliness. Guided by this data Heng Cui and colleagues (2024) study looked at how parks could support older adults with social interactions, rather than looking at activity levels. Parks may offer informal, open space opportunities for individuals to interact, both verbally and non-verbally. The study was conducted during 2023 in Anyong City, a medium sized city with a third of the population aged 50 years old or over, and focused around 2 districts which include 6 public parks. Participants were adults without long term care requirements and aged at least 50, with the sample consisting of 589 adults of whom 54% were female and 73% were retired. The majority (84%) were aged between 50 and 60. The analysis considered the role of participants personal factors, social factors and the physical attributes of the parks upon levels of social interaction. The results suggest that older women, participants with better health and those who visited the parks more had greater numbers of social interactions within the parks. Participants higher levels of perceived social cohesion and sense of belonging in the park were also influential factors on their level of interactions. With regard to the park environment, the participants rated its condition and features, such as seating, as highly influential upon social interactions, followed by accessibility and aesthetics. Safety in the park was the lowest influence, although the study used limited questions around this mainly relating to night time safety measures which may not be as applicable to an older age group. Again it is a correlational study, and one key influence not measured was the motivation for going to the park, without which it is hard to determine if the social interactions are an indirect benefit of an activity and how that activity supports interacting. The study was also conducted in summer, so results may be different across other seasons. Amongst the results the park characteristics that appear to support social interactions are useful findings for urban planning considerations.
For everyone?
Whatever you make of Strutt’s opinion his actions had the intention to increase access to greenspace for the 19th Century low-paid workers of Derby. While Loudon’s design was influenced by his gardenesque principles he also considered how the space would be used by the general public. Aside from their analysis on biomarkers and park proximity, the two 2023 studies from the US highlighted that the more economically and socially deprived areas included in their data had less exposure and access to greenspaces. The studies also highlighted that access was linked to ethnicity. These sociodemographic factors resulted in markedly reduced results in the biological ageing data for those participants.
A 2024 paper by Erica Cook and colleagues at the University of Bedfordshire explored further the sociodemographic factors to access and usage of parks as part the Chalkscapes project. Data was collected during 2022 in two English towns, Luton and Dunstable to consider residents use and access to greenspaces, principally parks, what they used the space for and for how long, along with their motivations for doing so. Luton has a very diverse population and lower than average health outcomes. The study results are based on 906 participants, aged 16 to 94 (mean age 38) who were predominately female (61%). A third of the participants regularly (at least once a week) visited a park. There was lower use of parks by non-white ethnic groups and those aged 50 or over. Top motivations for visiting a park were walking and being close to nature. Male participants reported using the parks for more sports and activity based uses, while female participants were more likely to report using the park for walking. Differences in use were found by ethnicity, suggesting that white British people reported more individual activities, such as dog walking, while South Asian ethnicities reported greater use of the parks as a social space. Indian and black Caribbean participants also reported using the parks to support religious events. Overall the use of public parks by the participants was lower than the national average, with only a third regularly visiting at least once a week. Barriers such as disability and age were reported, with the lowest usage found to be amongst the elderly, those from highly deprived areas and minority ethnic backgrounds. The results suggest that the greatest use of the parks came from participants who were more physically able and motivated by an activity. It is a cross-sectional report, the sample of these two towns may not be representative of the wider population and deprivation was considered by area and not at individual level. The authors suggest a future study should include adolescents as well as adults. In this study proximity to a park was not captured. The results suggest that while it may be the case public parks may be helpful to support older adults, in this study older participants were amongst those less likely to be using them.
“The park is an oasis from city life. It connects us to the outside world. It’s absolutely lovely.”
In 2015 Derby Arboretum celebrated 175 years, with residents sharing what it means to them. The park also benefited in its old age from heritage funding to help support its restoration.
During the Industrial Revolution in the UK there was an awareness, maybe a limited one and perhaps for some motivated by commercial reasons, that increasing urbanisation was reducing access to greenspaces which had health implications on workers. A similar awareness remains in the 21st century with concerns that increasing urbanisation and more technology based life is resulting in less connection with nature and impacts to public health. While the studies reviewed all hint at various physical and mental benefits to older people, I think the key messages from them are around the accessibility and support of spaces like parks for people of all age groups and backgrounds.
Whether parks can help with biological ageing is for me a moot point and a bit of a distraction. More important is for urban planners and park owners to reflect on how parks can help with social issues such as loneliness, encourage local community cohesion and support healthy activities.
So next time you are out in a park, take a moment to savour the connection with nature and perhaps smile or say hello to a passerby - it may be the only interaction they have that day.
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References
Cui, H., Maliki, N. Z., & Wang, Y. (2024). The Role of Urban Parks in Promoting Social Interaction of Older Adults in China. Sustainability, 16(5), 2088. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16052088
Cook, E. J., Kabasinguzi, I., Randhawa, G., & Ali, N. (2024). Factors influencing urban greenspace use among a multi-ethnic community in the UK: The Chalkscapes Study. Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, 92, 128210.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ufug.2024.128210
Kim, K., Joyce, B. T., Nannini, D. R., Zheng, Y., Gordon-Larsen, P., Shikany, J. M., ... & Hou, L. (2023). Inequalities in urban greenness and epigenetic aging: Different associations by race and neighborhood socioeconomic status. Science Advances, 9(26), eadf8140. https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/sciadv.adf8140
Motomura, M., Koohsari, M. J., Ishii, K., Shibata, A., Nakaya, T., Hanibuchi, T., ... & Oka, K. (2024). Park proximity and older adults’ physical activity and sedentary behaviors in dense urban areas. Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, 95, 128275. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ufug.2024.128275
Ogletree, S. S., Huang, J. H., Reif, D., Yang, L., Dunstan, C., Osakwe, N., ... & Hipp, J. A. (2023). The relationship between greenspace exposure and telomere length in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Science of the Total Environment, 905, 167452. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2023.167452