IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v67y2008i6p900-914.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do poorer people have poorer access to local resources and facilities? The distribution of local resources by area deprivation in Glasgow, Scotland

Author

Listed:
  • Macintyre, Sally
  • Macdonald, Laura
  • Ellaway, Anne

Abstract

It has commonly been suggested that in modern cities individual or household deprivation (for example, low income or education) is amplified by area level deprivation (for example, lack of jobs or good schools), in ways which damage the health of the poorest and increase health inequalities. The aim of this study was to determine the location of a range of resources and exposures by deprivation in a UK city. We examined the location of 42 resources in Glasgow City, Scotland, in 2005-2006, by quintile of small area deprivation. Measures included number per 1000 population, network distance to nearest resource, and percentage of data zones containing at least one of each type of resource. Twelve resources had higher density in, and/or were closer to or more common in, more deprived neighbourhoods: public nurseries, public primary schools, police stations, pharmacies, credit unions, post offices, bus stops, bingo halls, public swimming pools, public sports centres, outdoor play areas, and vacant and derelict land/buildings. Sixteen had higher density in, and/or were closer to, or more common in, more affluent neighbourhoods: public secondary schools, private schools, banks, building societies, museums/art galleries, railway stations, subway stations, tennis courts, bowling greens, private health clubs, private swimming pools, colleges, A & E hospitals, parks, waste disposal sites, and tourist attractions. Private nurseries, Universities, fire stations, general, dental and ophthalmic practices, pawn brokers, ATMs, supermarkets, fast food chains, cafes, public libraries, golf courses, and cinemas showed no clear pattern by deprivation. Thus it appears that in the early 21st century access to resources does not always disadvantage poorer neighbourhoods in the UK. We conclude that we need to ensure that theories and policies are based on up-to-date and context-specific empirical evidence on the distribution of neighbourhood resources, and to engage in further research on interactions between individual and environmental factors in shaping health and health inequalities.

Suggested Citation

  • Macintyre, Sally & Macdonald, Laura & Ellaway, Anne, 2008. "Do poorer people have poorer access to local resources and facilities? The distribution of local resources by area deprivation in Glasgow, Scotland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 67(6), pages 900-914, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:67:y:2008:i:6:p:900-914
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(08)00272-4
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Waitzman, N.J. & Smith, K.R., 1998. "Erratum: Phantom of the area: Poverty-area residence and mortality in the United States (American Journal of Public Health (1998) 88 (973-976))," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 88(7), pages 1122-1122.
    2. van Lenthe, F. J. & Brug, J. & Mackenbach, J. P., 2005. "Neighbourhood inequalities in physical inactivity: the role of neighbourhood attractiveness, proximity to local facilities and safety in the Netherlands," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 60(4), pages 763-775, February.
    3. Powell, L.M. & Slater, S. & Chaloupka, F.J. & Harper, D., 2006. "Availability of physical activity-related facilities and neighborhood demographic and socioeconomic characteristics: A national study," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 96(9), pages 1676-1680.
    4. Diez Roux, A.V., 2001. "Investigating neighborhood and area effects on health," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 91(11), pages 1783-1789.
    5. Macintyre, Sally & Ellaway, Anne & Cummins, Steven, 2002. "Place effects on health: how can we conceptualise, operationalise and measure them?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 125-139, July.
    6. Steven Cummins & Anne Findlay & Cassie Higgins & Mark Petticrew & Leigh Sparks & Hilary Thomson, 2008. "Reducing Inequalities in Health and Diet: Findings from a Study on the Impact of a Food Retail Development," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 40(2), pages 402-422, February.
    7. Schwartz, S., 1994. "The fallacy of the ecological fallacy: The potential misuse of a concept and the consequences," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 84(5), pages 819-824.
    8. Lia Karsten, 2002. "Mapping Childhood in Amsterdam: the spatial and social construction of children’s domains in the city," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 93(3), pages 231-241, August.
    9. Karvonen, Sakari & Rimpelä, Arja, 1996. "Socio-regional context as a determinant of adolescents' health behaviour in Finland," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 43(10), pages 1467-1474, November.
    10. Diez-Roux, A.V., 1998. "Bringing context back into epidemiology: Variables and fallacies in multilevel analysis," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 88(2), pages 216-222.
    11. Bernard, Paul & Charafeddine, Rana & Frohlich, Katherine L. & Daniel, Mark & Kestens, Yan & Potvin, Louise, 2007. "Health inequalities and place: A theoretical conception of neighbourhood," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(9), pages 1839-1852, November.
    12. Waitzman, N.J. & Smith, K.R., 1998. "Phantom of the area: Poverty-area residence and mortality in the United States," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 88(6), pages 973-976.
    13. Zenk, S.N. & Schulz, A.J. & Israel, B.A. & James, S.A. & Bao, S. & Wilson, M.L., 2005. "Neighborhood racial composition, neighborhood poverty, and the spatial accessibility of supermarkets in metropolitan Detroit," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 95(4), pages 660-667.
    14. S L Handy & D A Niemeier, 1997. "Measuring Accessibility: An Exploration of Issues and Alternatives," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 29(7), pages 1175-1194, July.
    15. Cummins, Steven & Curtis, Sarah & Diez-Roux, Ana V. & Macintyre, Sally, 2007. "Understanding and representing 'place' in health research: A relational approach," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(9), pages 1825-1838, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Maria Holst Algren & Carsten Kronborg Bak & Gabriele Berg-Beckhoff & Pernille Tanggaard Andersen, 2015. "Health-Risk Behaviour in Deprived Neighbourhoods Compared with Non-Deprived Neighbourhoods: A Systematic Literature Review of Quantitative Observational Studies," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(10), pages 1-17, October.
    2. Spielman, Seth E. & Yoo, Eun-hye, 2009. "The spatial dimensions of neighborhood effects," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(6), pages 1098-1105, March.
    3. Cannuscio, Carolyn C. & Weiss, Eve E. & Fruchtman, Hannah & Schroeder, Jeannette & Weiner, Janet & Asch, David A., 2009. "Visual epidemiology: Photographs as tools for probing street-level etiologies," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 69(4), pages 553-564, August.
    4. Petrović, Ana & Manley, David & van Ham, Maarten, 2018. "Freedom from the Tyranny of Neighbourhood: Rethinking Socio-Spatial Context Effects," IZA Discussion Papers 11416, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    5. Yingqi Guo & Shu-Sen Chang & Mengni Chen & Paul S. F. Yip, 2018. "Do Poorer Areas Have Poorer Access to Services in Hong Kong? A Small-Area Analysis Based on Multiple Spatial Accessibility Indicators," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 138(1), pages 1-21, July.
    6. Rainham, Daniel & McDowell, Ian & Krewski, Daniel & Sawada, Mike, 2010. "Conceptualizing the healthscape: Contributions of time geography, location technologies and spatial ecology to place and health research," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(5), pages 668-676, March.
    7. Etsuji Suzuki & Saori Kashima & Ichiro Kawachi & S V Subramanian, 2012. "Geographic Inequalities in All-Cause Mortality in Japan: Compositional or Contextual?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(6), pages 1-12, June.
    8. Petteway, Ryan J. & Mujahid, Mahasin & Allen, Amani & Morello-Frosch, Rachel, 2019. "The body language of place: A new method for mapping intergenerational “geographies of embodiment” in place-health research," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 223(C), pages 51-63.
    9. Garthwaite, Kayleigh & Bambra, Clare, 2017. "“How the other half live”: Lay perspectives on health inequalities in an age of austerity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 187(C), pages 268-275.
    10. Steffen Andreas Schüle & Gabriele Bolte, 2015. "Interactive and Independent Associations between the Socioeconomic and Objective Built Environment on the Neighbourhood Level and Individual Health: A Systematic Review of Multilevel Studies," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(4), pages 1-31, April.
    11. Jacob, Brian A. & Ludwig, Jens & Miller, Douglas L., 2013. "The effects of housing and neighborhood conditions on child mortality," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 195-206.
    12. Bécares, Laia & Nazroo, James & Albor, Christo & Chandola, Tarani & Stafford, Mai, 2012. "Examining the differential association between self-rated health and area deprivation among white British and ethnic minority people in England," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(4), pages 616-624.
    13. Santana, Paula & Santos, Rita & Nogueira, Helena, 2009. "The link between local environment and obesity: A multilevel analysis in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, Portugal," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(4), pages 601-609, February.
    14. Wen, Ming & Cagney, Kathleen A. & Christakis, Nicholas A., 2005. "Effect of specific aspects of community social environment on the mortality of Individuals diagnosed with serious illness," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(6), pages 1119-1134, September.
    15. Giatti, Luana & Barreto, Sandhi M. & César, Cibele C., 2010. "Unemployment and self-rated health: Neighborhood influence," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(4), pages 815-823, August.
    16. van Hooijdonk, Carolien & Droomers, Mariël & van Loon, Jeanne A.M. & van der Lucht, Fons & Kunst, Anton E., 2007. "Exceptions to the rule: Healthy deprived areas and unhealthy wealthy areas," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(6), pages 1326-1342, March.
    17. Vallée, Julie & Shareck, Martine & Le Roux, Guillaume & Kestens, Yan & Frohlich, Katherine L., 2020. "Is accessibility in the eye of the beholder? Social inequalities in spatial accessibility to health-related resources in Montréal, Canada," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 245(C).
    18. Southwell, Brian G. & Slater, Jonathan S. & Rothman, Alexander J. & Friedenberg, Laura M. & Allison, Tiffany R. & Nelson, Christina L., 2010. "The availability of community ties predicts likelihood of peer referral for mammography: Geographic constraints on viral marketing," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(9), pages 1627-1635, November.
    19. Jamie Pearce & Karen Witten & Rosemary Hiscock & Tony Blakely, 2008. "Regional and Urban–Rural Variations in the Association of Neighbourhood Deprivation with Community Resource Access: A National Study," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 40(10), pages 2469-2489, October.
    20. Adrian E. Ghenadenik & Katherine L. Frohlich & Lise Gauvin, 2016. "Beyond Smoking Prevalence: Exploring the Variability of Associations between Neighborhood Exposures across Two Nested Spatial Units and Two-Year Smoking Trajectory among Young Adults," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-18, January.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:67:y:2008:i:6:p:900-914. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.