Role of Parks as Settings for Physical Activity: The Neighborhood Parks and Active Living Study (NPAL)

Public health professionals can use information on activity patterns in non-traditional venues, like parks, to improve health and promote physical activity (PA). We examined associations between PA and park use using data from the Neighborhood Parks and Active Living (NPAL) study, a case-control study of adults aged >18 years, residing in Atlanta, Georgia. Case (park-user) selection was based on the intercept and consent of ever 3rd person who entered 11 urban parks. Controls (non-users) were randomly selected from persons who lived within the same catchment area as cases, matched on park distance. Data were collected from 238 park users and 241 non-users residing within a 3 mile park radius. We assessed PA using self-report (minutes of moderate- and vigorous-intensity physical activity) and categorized participation in total PA tertiles, minutes/week: low (01-160), moderate (161-435), high (>436) by sex, age, race/ethnicity and education. PA tertiles were modeled by park use using ordinal logistic regression adjusting for sex and age. Park users did not differ significantly from non-users by sex or race/ethnicity. A higher proportion of park users were 18-34 years of age (22.7% vs. 9.5%) and college educated (64.3% vs. 55.2%) than non-users (p<0.05). The odds of participating in high levels of PA versus low and moderate PA are 1.45 times greater for park users than non-users. Those who use parks are more likely to do high levels of PA than those who do not use parks. Public health professionals may consider promoting parks as a community-based venue to provide PA.