Acceptability of built environment interventions to improve healthy eating and physical activity among city dwellers in Saskatchewan, Canada: THEPA findings from a local context

ABSTRACT

Obesity and related chronic conditions present significant challenges in both national and global public health. Modifying the built environment stands as a population-level strategy to foster healthier behaviours and alleviate the burden of chronic diseases. The success of such interventions, however, hinges on their public acceptability, an aspect often overlooked. This study aimed to evaluate the level of public acceptability concerning diverse built environment interventions promoting healthy eating and physical activity within two major Canadian cities. We conducted an analysis of data gathered from 2,133 participants through a pan-Canadian survey, employing multilevel logistic regression. Interventions were categorized using the Nuffield Council on Bioethics’ ‘intervention ladder’, graded by their level of intrusiveness. Overall, individuals were more agreeable to implementing the least intrusive interventions in both food and physical activity domains. However, public support varied based on the type of intervention within and across different levels of intrusiveness. Notably, individuals self-identifying as women, Indigenous, or born outside of Canada demonstrated a higher likelihood of accepting interventions across all levels. The connection between neighborhood attributes and acceptability remained inconclusive. These locally pertinent findings carry practical implications for selecting, designing and implementing built environment interventions.

KEYWORDS:

• Built environment
• physical activity
• healthy eating
• interventions
• public acceptability

This article is related to:

Research for city practice

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/23748834.2024.2304926

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) under [FRN #148919 and IP2 #150710].

Notes on contributors

Lise Gauvin

The THEPA Study is a research initiative funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and co-led by Lise Gauvin PhD and Nazeem Muhajarine PhD. Lise Gauvin is a professor in the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, École de santé publique, Université de Montréal and Associate Scientific Director for population Health, CRCHUM. Nazeem Muhajarine is a professor in the Department of Community Health and Epidemiology, University of Saskatchewan, and Director of the Saskatchewan Population Health and Evaluation Research Unit (SPHERU). Sahana Ramamoorthy MSc is a doctoral student at the University of Saskatchewan. This work is based on SR’s Master of Science thesis research. In addition to the named authors on this paper, Chris Schulz, Registered Professional Planner, and Planning Projects Service Manager at the City of Saskatoon, and Kadia Saint-Onge PhD at the Université de Montréal have made valuable contributions to this research; specifically, in the area of policy perspectives (CS) and in design and conduct of the THEPA survey through a Delphi process (KS-O).