Is it your neighbors or the neighborhood making you sick? Lifestyle, built environment, and COVID-19 transmission
International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis
ISSN: 1753-8270
Article publication date: 12 June 2024
Abstract
Purpose
This paper examines the early pandemic experience in a large metropolitan area to differentiate the roles of the lifestyle and built environment factors associated with differing case rates across neighborhoods.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper develops a simple empirical methodology for sorting out the separate effects of lifestyle and the built environment factors along with their interactive effects when individuals’ behaviors not only reflect their observable characteristics but also are influenced by the physical environments in which they live and work, indirect connections implied by the early insights of Jacobs (1961) and more recently Hawley and Turnbull (2019).
Findings
The results demonstrate that lifestyle factors tied to employment show the strongest association with COVID-19 cases. Other lifestyle choices, built environment features, and demographic attributes such as household size, principal cities, highway connectivity, and population density also affect COVID-19 transmission at the onset of the disease outbreak. The analysis reveals a surprising spatial pattern; employment-related lifestyle factors on case rates in outlying neighborhoods are stronger than in neighborhoods within primary cities after accounting for various built environment factors.
Originality/value
This research addresses important questions and the perplexing outcomes related to lifestyle and the built environment’s multi-faceted role in spreading COVID-19. In addition, this study represents a pioneering effort in disentangling the pure lifestyle effect on virus transmission after eliminating potentially confounding impacts of built environment factors on household behavior that in turn influence virus transmission.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors sincerely acknowledge insightful comments provided by the Editor and three anonymous reviewers.
Funding: This research received no external funding.
Conflicts of interest: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Credit authorship contribution statement:
Geoffrey K. Turnbull. Conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis and investigation, writing—original draft preparation, writing—review and editing, and resources; Supervision.
Sourav Batabyal. Conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis and investigation, writing—original draft preparation, writing—review and editing, and resources.
Robert Salvino. Conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis and investigation, writing—original draft preparation, writing—review and editing, and resources.
Phillip K. Njoroge. Conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis and investigation, writing—original draft preparation, writing—review and editing, and resources.
Citation
Turnbull, G.K., Salvino, R., Njoroge, P.K. and Batabyal, S. (2024), "Is it your neighbors or the neighborhood making you sick? Lifestyle, built environment, and COVID-19 transmission", International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJHMA-04-2024-0050
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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