Suzanne Mavoa

University of Melbourne | MSD · Melbourne School of Population Health

Natural environments may be important for subjective wellbeing, yet evidence is sparse and measures of nature are unspecific. We used linear regression models to investigate the relationship between greenness, biodiversity and blue space and subjective wellbeing in 4,912 adults living in metropolitan Melbourne, Australia. Greenness (overall, privat...

While emerging research suggests urban green space revegetation increases soil microbiota diversity and native plant species affect skin microbiome diversity, there is still a paucity of knowledge on relationships between neighborhood environmental conditions and the human microbiome. This study leveraged data on human microbiome samples (nose, mou...

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are major contributors to morbidity and mortality in lower-middle-income countries (LMICs). Features of the natural environment, such as greenness, are a potential, modifiable determinant of CVD, yet there is a lack of evidence, particularly in LMICs. Our study investigated associations between residential greenness,...

Background The home environment is the most important location in young children’s lives, yet few studies have examined the relationship between the outdoor home environment and child physical activity levels, and even fewer have used objectively measured exposures and outcomes. This study examined relationships between objectively assessed home ya...

Parental preconception exposures to built and natural outdoor environments could influence pregnancy and birth outcomes either directly, or via a range of health-related behaviours and conditions. However, there is no existing review summarising the evidence linking natural and built characteristics, such as air and noise pollution, walkability, gr...

Early nurturing relationships are crucial for adaptive child development. The objectives of the study were to investigate whether the availability of natural environments was associated with nurturing parenting practices, mother-infant bonding, and infant socioemotional function at one year of age. Data were from the Australian Temperament Project...

Background: Across the life course, socioeconomic disadvantage disproportionately afflicts those with genetic predispositions to inflammatory diseases. We describe how socioeconomic disadvantage and polygenic risk for high BMI magnify the risk of obesity across childhood, and using causal analyses, explore the hypothetical impact of intervening on...

Measuring and monitoring the spatial distribution of liveability is crucial to ensure that implemented urban and transport planning decisions support health and wellbeing. Spatial liveability indicators can be used to ensure these decisions are effective, equitable and tracked across time. The 2018 Australian National Liveability Study datasets com...

Unlabelled: Exposure to ambient air pollution has been associated with reduced cognitive function in childhood and later life, with too few mid-life studies to draw conclusions. In contrast, residential greenness has been associated with enhanced cognitive function throughout the lifecourse. Here we examine the extent to which (Ritchie and Roser,...

Limited research has explored associations between blue spaces and mental health, specifically in children. This study assessed links between coastal proximity and depression and anxiety among children in Australia and tested whether duration of residency at current address moderated associations. It also explored associations between within‐indivi...

Green infrastructure plays a vital role in urban ecosystems. This includes sustaining biodiversity and human health. Despite a large number of studies investigating greenspace disparities in suburban areas, no known studies have compared the green attributes (e.g., trees, greenness, and greenspaces) of urban centres . Consequently, there may be unc...

Human environments influence human health in both positive and negative ways. Green space is considered an environmental exposure that confers benefits to human health and has attracted a high level of interest from researchers, policy makers, and increasingly clinicians. Green space has been associated with a range of health benefits, such as impr...

RESUMEN Las políticas y los planes de la ciudad juegan un papel importante en la promoción de la actividad física a través de cambios en el diseño urbano y los sistemas de transporte. Los objetivos de este estudio fue describir los cambios longitudinales y relevantes en el entorno construido para la actividad física en el tiempo libre y los viajes...

Urban liveability is a global priority for creating healthy, sustainable cities. Measurement of policy-relevant spatial indicators of the built and natural environment supports city planning at all levels of government. Analysis of their spatial distribution within cities, and impacts on individuals and communities, is crucial to ensure planning de...

Background While urban built environments might promote active ageing, an infrequently studied question is how the neighbourhood walkability modulates physical activity changes during a physical activity intervention program in older adults. We assessed the influence of objectively assessed neighbourhood walkability on the change in physical activi...

Analysis of overhead imagery using computer vision is a problem that has received considerable attention in academic literature. Most techniques that operate in this space are both highly specialised and require expensive manual annotation of large datasets. These problems are addressed here through the development of a more generic framework, inco...

1. In the absence of effective and scalable human intervention, up to 95% of the world's ecosystems will be affected by anthropogenic degradation by 2050. Therefore, immediate and large-scale ecological restoration is imperative to stem biodiversity loss and ecosystem decline. Ecologists must draw upon the most effective and efficient tools availab...

Background: Growing evidence shows the positive influence of neighbourhood green space on mental well-being among adults through multiple health behaviours, but similar studies are lacking for adolescents. Methods: Data were drawn from the 2019 wave of the Youth2000 survey series in Aotearoa, New Zealand with secondary school students (aged 10-19 y...

Measures of individual mobility, such as activity space, have been previously used to help improve our understanding of individuals’ interactions with their everyday environments. However, such methods have rarely been adopted in studying children's physical activity and active travel behavior. In this study, we use a combination of participatory m...

Background: While exposure to environmental greenness in childhood has shown mixed associations with the development of allergic disease, the relationship with food allergy has not been explored. We investigated the association between exposure to environmental greenness and challenge-confirmed food allergy in a large population-based cohort. Met...

Background Outdoor public recreation spaces are important settings for leisure and physical activity. Adolescents’ use of these spaces may contribute to social connectedness via social interaction with peers and the community in these settings. However, research on this topic is limited. This exploratory study examined associations of frequency of...

Regular participation in physical activity is essential for children’s physical, mental, and cognitive health. Neighborhood environments may be especially important for children who are more likely to spend time in the environment proximal to home. This article provides an update of evidence for associations between children’s physical activity beh...

IgE-mediated food allergy is an increasing public health concern in many regions around the world. Although genetics play a role in the development of food allergy, the reported increase has occurred largely within a single generation and therefore it is unlikely that this can be accounted for by changes in the human genome. Environmental factors m...

Dementia is a public health priority1 and the current study designed to investigate associations between built and social environmental characteristics and dementia incidence, and the estimated future risk of dementia. Further we investigated spatial variations in dementia risk and dementia incidence to identify unmet areas for policy intervention....

Background In Australia, the Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA), which includes the Index of Relative Socioeconomic Disadvantage (IRSD), captures the socioeconomic characteristics of areas. Because SEIFA rankings are relative to the country or state, the decile categorisations may not reflect an area’s socioeconomic standing relative to areas...

Background: Dementia is a major global health challenge and the impact of built and social environments' characteristics on dementia risk have not yet been fully evaluated. Objective: To investigate associations between built and social environmental characteristics and diagnosed dementia cases and estimated dementia risk. Methods: We recruite...

Background: Outdoor public recreation spaces are important settings for leisure and physical activity. Adolescents’ use of these spaces may be related to their social connectedness; however, research on this topic is limited. This study examined associations of frequency of visitation and physical activity in outdoor public recreation spaces with s...

Understanding changes in urban vegetation is essential for ensuring sustainable and healthy cities, mitigating disturbances due to climate change, sustaining urban biodiversity, and supporting human health and wellbeing. This study investigates and describes the distribution and dynamic changes in urban vegetation over a 15-year period in Greater M...

Understanding changes in urban vegetation is essential for ensuring sustainable and healthy cities, mitigating disturbances due to climate change, sustaining urban biodiversity, and supporting human health and wellbeing. This study investigates and describes the distribution and dynamic changes in urban vegetation over a 15-year period in Greater M...

Google Earth Engine provides researchers with a platform for conducting planetary scale analysis of environmental processes and landcover change, both by providing the necessary tools and by handling the large quantities of data these analyses require. The most widely used moderate-resolution sensors, onboard the Landsat satellite platforms, often...

Objectives Cross-sectional studies have found some built environmental attributes to be associated with residents’ lower levels of mobility (functional capacity to walk outside the home). However, less is known about what environmental attributes are related to mobility decline. This longitudinal study examined area-level associations of specific e...

This study aimed to systematically identify, map out, and describe geographical information systems (GIS)-based approaches that have been employed to measure children's neighborhood geographies for physical activity behaviors. Forty studies were included, most were conducted in the USA. Heterogeneity in GIS methods and measures was found. The major...

Background While urban built environments might promote active ageing, an infrequently studied question is how the neighbourhood walkability modulates physical activity changes during a physical activity intervention programme in older adults. We assessed the influence of objectively assessed neighbourhood walkability on the change in physical acti...

Active school travel contributes to children’s physical, mental and social wellbeing. The prevalence of children’s active school travel, however, has been declining in many developed countries. Gaining insights into school culture and environments in relation to school travel behaviour is crucial to inform interventions. Using a multiphase mixed me...

Few studies examine associations between objectively-calculated neighbourhood built environment attributes and objectively-assessed sedentary behaviour in different geographical locations, especially in highly-populated environments. Additionally, no study, to our knowledge, has investigated associations between objective measures of neighbourhood...

This systematic review summarised and evaluated the evidence for associations between green space and adolescents' mental well-being. The PRISMA statement guidelines were followed for reporting systematic reviews. Fourteen articles met the inclusion criteria for this review. Synthesis suggests beneficial associations between green space exposure an...

Falls are a leading cause of injury and accidental death, particularly amongst older people. Evidence of environmental risk factors for pedestrian falls among older adults could support age-friendly urban design and contribute to efforts to reduce the incidence of pedestrian falls and support outdoor mobility among older adults. Yet investigation o...

Adolescents have the potential to be active in multiple places across weekdays and weekends. While the built environment features around home are known to be important for adolescents' physical activity, specific built environment features that facilitate physical activity outside the home neighbourhood are not well explored. Given that adolescents...

Good public transport accessibility is associated with active travel, but this is under-researched among adolescents. We tested associations between public transport accessibility and active travel among school-going adolescents (12–18 years; n = 1329) from Melbourne, Australia analysing Victorian Integrated Survey of Travel and Activity data. Outc...

Introduction Active school travel (AST) is important for child and environmental health. In New Zealand, AST has declined over recent decades and is relatively low compared to many other countries. A plethora of evidence related to children's AST exists, yet a holistic and context-specific understanding of factors related to the behaviour remains e...

Without accurate awareness of features within the built environment, the availability of a supportive built environment alone may not be sufficient to influence physical activity levels. We examined the moderating effects of concordance/discordance between selected objective and perceived built environment features in the relationship between objec...

Background: This study aimed to assess the early impact of national alcohol trading hour restrictions on night-time violence in New Zealand. The new national maximum trading hour restrictions prohibited 24-hour trading by reducing hours to between 8am and 4am for on-premises and between 7am and 11pm for take-away outlets. Methods: A telephone su...

Background: Increasing emphasis has been placed on improving physical activity levels through multilevel interventions. This study aims to examine moderating effects of neighborhood safety (crime and traffic) and social support (from parent and sibling/peer) for physical activity in the relationship between the built environment and moderate-to-vi...

Background: An infrequently studied question is how the objective measurement of neighborhood walkability modulates physical activity changes during a physical activity intervention program in older adults. We assessed the influence of objectively assessed neighborhood walkability inside the city limits of Palma de Mallorca on the change in physica...

Spatial lifecourse epidemiology is an interdisciplinary field that utilizes advanced spatial, location-based, and artificial intelligence technologies to investigate the long-term effects of environmental, behavioural, psychosocial, and biological factors on health-related states and events and the underlying mechanisms. With the growing number of...

Natural environments – green spaces, blue spaces (such as lakes, rivers and beaches), and biodiversity – have potential health benefits. However, there is lack of knowledge about the relationships between these environments and adolescent emotional health. Our study assessed the relationship between the natural environments of residential neighbour...

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translate...

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translate...

Background: Cities are home to over half the global population; that proportion is expected to rise to 70% by mid-century. The urban environment differs greatly from that in which humans evolved, with potentially important consequences for health. Rates for allergic, inflammatory and auto-immune diseases appear to rise with urbanization and be hig...

Abstract Background Living in walkable neighborhoods may provide long-term cardio-metabolic health benefits to residents. Little empirical research has examined the behavioral mechanisms in this relationship. In this longitudinal study, we examined the potential mediating role of physical activity (baseline and 12-year change) in the relationships...

Existing community gardening research has tended to be exploratory and descriptive, utilising qualitative or mixed methodologies to explore and understand community garden participation. While research on community gardening attracts growing interest, the empirical rigour of measurement scales and embedded indicators has received comparatively less...

Background: Most research on walking for transport has focused on the walkability of residential neighborhoods, overlooking the contribution of places of work/study and the ease with which destinations outside the immediate neighborhood can be accessed, referred to as regional accessibility. Objectives: We aimed to examine if local accessibility...

Various accelerometers have been used in research measuring physical activity (PA) and sedentary behavior (SB). This study compared two triaxial accelerometers—Active style Pro (ASP) and ActiGraph (AG)—in measuring PA and SB during work and nonwork days in free-living conditions. A total of 50 working participants simultaneously wore these two acce...

Background Adolescents engage in various combinations (typologies) of physical activity and sedentary behaviors, which impact their health and wellbeing in different ways. As such, there is a need to understand the factors that may inhibit or facilitate engagement in combinations of activity-related behaviors to help inform effective intervention s...

Researchers investigating relationships between the neighbourhood environment and health first need to decide on the spatial extent of the neighbourhood they are interested in. This decision is an important and ongoing methodological challenge since different methods of defining and delineating neighbourhood boundaries can produce different results...

Children’s independent mobility is declining internationally. Parents are the gatekeepers of children’s independent mobility. This mixed methods study investigates whether parent perceptions of the neighbourhood environment align with objective measures of the neighbourhood built environment, and how perceived and objective measures relate to paren...

Compositional data techniques are an emerging method in physical activity research. These techniques account for the complexities of, and interrelationships between, behaviours that occur throughout a day (e.g., physical activity, sitting, and sleep). The field of health geography research is also developing rapidly. Novel spatial techniques and da...

Numerous studies have shown associations between public open space and a variety of health outcomes. Yet the extent to which firm conclusions and planning policy recommendations can be drawn from this body of work depends on how public open space availability has been measured and reported. Other researchers have highlighted potential issues with t...

Background: Children's active transport (AT) is a potential source of habitual physical activity with established health benefits. We aimed to examine built environment and household travel characteristics as predictors of AT to school and total daily duration of physical activity accumulated via AT. Methods: Cross-sectional household travel survey...

Objective: When using global positioning systems (GPS) to assess an individual's exposure to their environment, a first step in data cleaning is to establish minimum GPS 'inclusion criteria' (a set of rules used to determine which GPS data are able to be included in analyses). Care is needed at this stage to avoid any data exclusion (data loss) sy...

The safety in numbers (SiN) effect for cyclists is widely observed but remains poorly understood. Although most studies investigating the SiN phenomenon have focused on behavioural adaptation to ‘numbers’ of cyclists in the road network, previous work in simulated environments has suggested SiN may instead be driven by increases in local cyclist sp...

Walkability indices can guide planning and policy for more sustainable and liveble cities. Land-use mix is an important component of walkability that can be measured in a number of ways. Many land-use mix measures require fine-scaled land-use data that are not always available, especially when analyzing walkability across larger geographic extents....

The advertising of unhealthy food and beverages forms an important component of obesogenic environments. Such marketing to children is a key health determinant because of its impact on dietary preference and food purchasing behaviour. The location of outdoor advertising is important in exploring obesogenic environments and children's neighbourhoods...