Demographic data in the built environment and human health studies

Abstract

Demographic data is widely used in both built environment and population health studies. Traditional data sources include national, state, and local surveys as well as archived data from longitudinal studies and newly emerging sources such as digitally accessible administrative data and real-time data from mobile devices. The value of these diverse data sets hinges on their accuracy, completeness, reliability, relevance, and timeliness. This chapter reviews the literature published in this field, provides a selective overview of the extant published research based on such data, and offers suggestions for the continuing access and use of such datasets.

Impacts of hospitals users’ characteristics on perceptions of the physical environment

“…It is generally accepted that excluding these demographic factors will skew our understanding of the ways in which different elements of the physical environment impact human health. By including demographic data, researchers can better understand how various groups are impacted by their physical environment and develop methods for achieving healing environment when social demographic variables are incorporated in studies of the built environment and human health [ 14 ].…”