The effects of naturalness, gender, and age on how urban green space is perceived and used

Abstract

Neighbourhood green space serves an important function for the urban population, and provides valuable ecosystem services for human well-being. In this article, we investigate the effects of naturalness, gender, and age on the activities, aesthetics, and self-reported well-being associated with urban green space. Our findings are based on a postal survey of residents living in close proximity to six different green spaces in the city of Gothenburg, Sweden. It is shown that higher perceived naturalness generated more activities and higher aesthetic values and self-reported well-being for residents living close to urban green spaces. The results also indicated that, regardless of the type of naturalness, women were more active in urban green spaces than were men. Women also saw greater aesthetic value in green spaces than men did, and had higher self-reported well-being associated with the urban green spaces. Finally, older residents were shown to participate in a greater number of nature-related activities than younger residents. Older residents also saw greater aesthetic values and had higher self-reported well-being associated with urban green spaces than younger people did. Seemingly, this poses a considerable planning challenge if areas of perceived naturalness are to be retained in cities, since the present trend is for reduced green spaces in cities and a 'parkification' of surviving natural areas. Further, because of the importance of perceived natural areas to the elderly, and in particularly women, distances to urban green areas should not be too great. (C) 2016 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.

Keywords

Cultural ecosystem services; Green infrastructure; Landscape planning; Well-being

Published in

Urban Forestry and Urban Greening
2016, volume: 18, pages: 268-276
Publisher: ELSEVIER GMBH, URBAN & FISCHER VERLAG

SLU Authors

• Ode Sang, Åsa

  • Department of Landscape Architecture, Planning and Management, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

• Hedblom, Marcus

  • Department of Forest Resource Management, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Associated SLU-program

Nature experiences and health

Global goals (SDG)

SDG3 Good health and well-being
SDG5 Gender equality
SDG11 Sustainable cities and communities

UKÄ Subject classification

Other Biological Topics

Publication identifier

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ufug.2016.06.008

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/77861