The wellbeing of adolescents and the role of greenness: A cross-sectional study among Italian students

Giacomo Scaioli; Giulia Squillacioti; Michela Bersia; Valeria Bellisario; Alberto Borraccino; Roberto Bono; Paola Dalmasso; Patrizia Lemma

doi:10.3389/fpubh.2022.1050533

The wellbeing of adolescents and the role of greenness: A cross-sectional study among Italian students

Front Public Health. 2023 Jan 18:10:1050533. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.1050533. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Giacomo Scaioli¹, Giulia Squillacioti¹, Michela Bersia^{1

2}, Valeria Bellisario^{1

2}, Alberto Borraccino¹, Roberto Bono¹, Paola Dalmasso¹, Patrizia Lemma¹

Affiliations

¹ Department of Public Health and Pediatrics, University of Torino, Torino, Italy.
² Post Graduate School of Medical Statistics, University of Torino, Torino, Italy.

Abstract

Introduction: Adolescence is a critical period of life, and the level of wellbeing acquired during this stage might have an influence on health status in adulthood. The wellbeing of adolescents is associated with both biological and environmental determinants. To date, few studies have evaluated the effect of exposure to urban green spaces (i.e., greenness) on adolescents' wellbeing. Therefore, the aim of this study is to assess the association between exposure to greenness and the wellbeing of adolescents, accounting for the level of urbanization surrounding schools.

Methods: In the frame of the 2018 Italian Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC), we analyzed cross-sectional data from the Piedmont Region. Exposure to greenness was quantified by the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). Schools were geocoded, and a fixed buffer (radius 1,500 m) centered on each school was then built to enable average NDVI calculations. Adolescents' wellbeing was assessed by self-reported psychological, somatic, and psychosomatic health complaints as follows. Respondents were asked how often, in the last 6 months, they had experienced: (a) headache, (b) stomachache, (c) backache, (d) dizziness, (e) feeling low, (f) irritability or bad temper, (g) feeling nervous, and (h) difficulties getting to sleep using the HBSC Symptom Checklist (HBSC-SCL), an eight-item tool. Multivariable, multilevel logistic regression models tested the association between exposure to NDVI and psychosomatic, somatic, and psychological health complaints, one at a time, using schools as a random intercept.

Results: In total, 2065 subjects (47.6% girls) aged 11 (48.4%) and 13 (51.6%) years were involved. Greenness was found to be inversely associated with reported psychosomatic (OR 0.72, 95% CI: 0.53-0.98) and psychological health complaints (OR 0.67, 95% CI: 0.49-0.92) in boys only, adjusting for age, urbanization level, and socioeconomic status, and stratifying by gender.

Discussion: Our results support the implementation of future policies for urban environmental design supporting the increase of green spaces, as suggested by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Further studies are needed to confirm our findings.

Keywords: adolescents; greenness; psychosomatic health complaints; urbanization; wellbeing.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adolescent
Anxiety*
Child
Cross-Sectional Studies
Emotions*
Female
Humans
Male
Students / psychology

Grants and funding

The Italian HBSC survey is promoted and funded by the Ministry of Health/National Center for Disease Prevention and Control (CCM) and the Italian National Institute of Health [CCM Gestione trasferimento progressivo sorveglianze (26 May 2016–31 December 2017)].