BEST MoveS: The Built Environment Space-Time MOVEment Study A Framework for Objective Measurement of Behavior, Movement and Exposure in Urban Environments

Exposure to features of the built environment is commonly theorized to affect important health-related behaviors and conditions, such as active transportation and access to healthy foods. However, built environment has generally been measured solely within proximity of the home location. This research provides a method for measuring and summarizing environmental properties for the complete space-time realm of experience using high resolution objective data on environment and behavior. A convenience sample of fifty-one subjects was enrolled in a one week cross-sectional study, in which individual movements and activity during waking hours were tracked at a one second interval using a novel multi-sensing device that included a GPS receiver/data logger. Subjects also completed a sociodemographic survey as well as the International Physical Activity Questionnaire, a self-report based instrument for estimating physical activity levels. The characteristics of their sensed location traces were obtained using a newly developed set of analytical raster data sets known as SmartMaps, which represented spatially continuous measures of localized neighborhood values for variables within the built environment domains of neighborhood structure; utilitarian destinations; recreation; transportation and traffic; and land use composition and configuration.;Three basic movement types were identified: dwells (places where no movement occurred across XY space), trips (traces that represented movement across XY space), and stops (relatively brief non-moving intervals within trips). Characteristics of different built environment variables were found to differ significantly for traces sensed at home vs. non-home locations, for trips vs. dwells, for short distance vs. long distance trips, and for fast vs. slow trips. Built environment characteristics did not differ by overall levels of self-reported physical activity.;This research shows that environmental characteristics differ for home and non-home locations and for a variety of movement types. Given the amount of time that is spent away from home, estimates of the effects of environment on behavior should include not only built environment measures near home, but measures of environment for the entire realm of movement through space and time. To address this need, this research presents an operationalized method for linking objective measures of localized environment and behavior through space and time.