The use of Enhanced Vegetation Index for assessing access to different types of green space in epidemiological studies

Mizen, Amy; Thompson, Daniel A.; Watkins, Alan; Akbari, Ashley; Garrett, Joanne K.; Geary, Rebecca; Lovell, Rebecca; Lyons, Ronan A.; Nieuwenhuijsen, Mark J.; Parker, Sarah C.; Rowney, Francis M.; Song, Jiao; Stratton, Gareth; Wheeler, Benedict W.; White, James; White, Mathew P.; Williams, Sue; Rodgers, Sarah E.; Fry, Richard

The use of Enhanced Vegetation Index for assessing access to different types of green space in epidemiological studies

Mostra el registre complet Registre parcial de l'ítem

dc.contributor.author Mizen, Amy
dc.contributor.author Thompson, Daniel A.
dc.contributor.author Watkins, Alan
dc.contributor.author Akbari, Ashley
dc.contributor.author Garrett, Joanne K.
dc.contributor.author Geary, Rebecca
dc.contributor.author Lovell, Rebecca
dc.contributor.author Lyons, Ronan A.
dc.contributor.author Nieuwenhuijsen, Mark J.
dc.contributor.author Parker, Sarah C.
dc.contributor.author Rowney, Francis M.
dc.contributor.author Song, Jiao
dc.contributor.author Stratton, Gareth
dc.contributor.author Wheeler, Benedict W.
dc.contributor.author White, James
dc.contributor.author White, Mathew P.
dc.contributor.author Williams, Sue
dc.contributor.author Rodgers, Sarah E.
dc.contributor.author Fry, Richard
dc.date.accessioned 2024-07-02T06:22:32Z
dc.date.available 2024-07-02T06:22:32Z
dc.date.issued 2024
dc.description.abstract Background: Exposure to green space can protect against poor health through a variety of mechanisms. However, there is heterogeneity in methodological approaches to exposure assessments which makes creating effective policy recommendations challenging. Objective: Critically evaluate the use of a satellite-derived exposure metric, the Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), for assessing access to different types of green space in epidemiological studies. Methods: We used Landsat 5-8 (30 m resolution) to calculate average EVI for a 300 m radius surrounding 1.4 million households in Wales, UK for 2018. We calculated two additional measures using topographic vector data to represent access to green spaces within 300 m of household locations. The two topographic vector-based measures were total green space area stratified by type and average private garden size. We used linear regression models to test whether EVI could discriminate between publicly accessible and private green space and Pearson correlation to test associations between EVI and green space types. Results: Mean EVI for a 300 m radius surrounding households in Wales was 0.28 (IQR = 0.12). Total green space area and average private garden size were significantly positively associated with corresponding EVI measures (β = < 0.0001, 95% CI: 0.0000, 0.0000; β = 0.0001, 95% CI: 0.0001, 0.0001 respectively). In urban areas, as average garden size increases by 1 m2, EVI increases by 0.0002. Therefore, in urban areas, to see a 0.1 unit increase in EVI index score, garden size would need to increase by 500 m2. The very small β values represent no 'measurable real-world' associations. When stratified by type, we observed no strong associations between greenspace and EVI. Impact: It is a widely implemented assumption in epidiological studies that an increase in EVI is equivalent to an increase in greenness and/or green space. We used linear regression models to test associations between EVI and potential sources of green reflectance at a neighbourhood level using satellite imagery from 2018. We compared EVI measures with a 'gold standard' vector-based dataset that defines publicly accessible and private green spaces. We found that EVI should be interpreted with care as a greater EVI score does not necessarily mean greater access to publicly available green spaces in the hyperlocal environment.
dc.format.mimetype application/pdf
dc.identifier.citation Mizen A, Thompson DA, Watkins A, Akbari A, Garrett JK, Geary R, et al. The use of Enhanced Vegetation Index for assessing access to different types of green space in epidemiological studies. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol. 2024 Sep;34(5):753-60. DOI: 10.1038/s41370-024-00650-5
dc.identifier.doi http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41370-024-00650-5
dc.identifier.issn 1559-0631
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/10230/60630
dc.language.iso eng
dc.publisher Nature Research
dc.relation.ispartof J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol. 2024 Sep;34(5):753-60
dc.rights © The Author(s) 2024. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
dc.rights.accessRights info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
dc.rights.uri http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.subject.keyword Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI)
dc.subject.keyword Exposure assessment
dc.subject.keyword Epidemiological studies
dc.subject.keyword Residential greenness
dc.title The use of Enhanced Vegetation Index for assessing access to different types of green space in epidemiological studies
dc.type info:eu-repo/semantics/article
dc.type.version info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

Col·leccions

Articles (Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) – Campus Mar)