Spatial Characteristics of Urban Green Spaces and Human Health: An Exploratory Analysis of Canonical Correlation

Abstract

In highly urbanized areas, urban green spaces (UGSs) are important natural and cultural entities. Previous studies have shown some evidence of positive relationships between UGSs and human health. Most of these studies relied on self-reported health data and often used institutional quantitative measures of UGSs instead of the spatial characteristics of UGSs. This study analyzed the relationships between the spatial characteristics of UGSs and morbidity of diseases, which were considered variables of human health in the Taipei Metro. The Longitudinal Health Insurance Database of Taiwan was applied as the source of morbidity of diseases. A canonical correlation analysis was performed by using the six variables of spatial characteristics of UGSs as predictors and three variables of morbidity as criterion variables to evaluate the multivariate shared relationships between the two variable sets. The results found a strong canonical correlation between the spatial characteristics of UGSs and human health. Furthermore, the results revealed that living in districts with a higher area percentage of green spaces and denser vegetation cover, as well as exposure to more aggregative and irregular-shape green spaces, can reduce the morbidity of diseases.