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Mental health and quality of residential environment

Department of Psychological Medicine, School of Medicine, Cardiff University

Nikki Weaver, MSc, Joanne Patterson, BSc and Phil Jones, PhD

Centre For Research in the Built Environment, Welsh School of Architecture, Cardiff University

Truda Bell, MSc, Rebecca Playle, PhD, Frank Dunstan, DPhil and Stephen Palmer, FFPHM

Department of Epidemiology, Statistics and Public Health, School of Medicine, Cardiff University, Cardiff

Glyn Lewis, FRCPsych, PhD and Ricardo Araya, MRCPsych, PhD

Division of Psychiatry, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK

Correspondence: Professor Glyn Lewis, Division of Psychiatry, University of Bristol, Cotham House, Cotham Hill, Bristol BS6 6JL, UK. Tel: +44 (0)117 954 6796; fax: +44 (0)117 954 6672; email: Glyn.Lewis{at}bristol.ac.uk

Declaration of interest None.

Background There is increasing interest in the proposition that residential environment can affect mental health.

Aims To study the degree to which common mental disorder clusters according to postcode units and households. To investigate whether contextual measures of residential environment quality and geographical accessibility are associated with symptoms of common mental disorder.

Method A total of 1058 individuals aged 16–75 years (response rate 66%) participated in a cross-sectional survey. The 12-item General Health Questionnaire measured symptoms of common mental disorder.

Results Only 2% (95% CI 0–6) of the unexplained variation in symptoms existed at postcode unit level, whereas 37% (95% CI 27–49) existed at household-level, but the postcode unit variation was reduced to zero after adjustments. There was little evidence to suggest that residential quality or accessibility were associated with symptoms.

Conclusions There was substantial unexplained variation at the household level but we could find no evidence of postcode unit variation and no association with residential environmental quality or geographical accessibility. It is likely that the psychosocial environment is more important than the physical environment in relation to common mental disorder.

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Highlights of this issue

Kimberlie Dean
BJP 2007 191: A21. [Full Text]