What Types of Greenspaces Are Associated with Depression in Urban and Rural Older Adults? A Multilevel Cross-Sectional Study from JAGES

Depression in older adults is a public health challenge. We aimed to clarify the relationship between depression in older adults and three types of neighborhood greenspaces: trees, grasslands, and fields. We utilized data from the Japan Gerontological Evaluation Study (JAGES) performed in 2016. Multilevel logistic regression analysis was used for non-stratified and stratified analyses for the urban-rural regions. The target population comprised 126,878 older adults (age ≥ 65 years) who responded to the depression questions and were living in 881 neighborhoods in Japan. Depression was diagnosed based on a Geriatric Depression Scale score ≥5, and 20.4% of the study population had depression. In the pre-stratification analysis, areas with more greenspaces revealed lower odds of depression (odds ratio (OR) 0.95, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.85-0.95). In urban areas, more trees correlated with lower odds of depression (OR 0.94, 95% CI 0.89-1.00). In rural areas, moderate amounts of grassland were associated with lower odds of depression compared to areas with fewer grasslands (OR 0.91, 95% CI 0.83-1.00). We found that urban areas with higher tree density and rural areas with moderate amounts of grassland were associated with lower odds of depression.