Neighborhood Physical Disorder and Psychological Distress

Abstract

Although research documents a link between neighborhood physical disorder and psychological distress, we know little about the extent to which this association varies by age. Utilizing the person–environment fit model and drawing on data from the fourth wave of the Americans’ Changing Lives Survey, we examine the extent to which age influences the association between perceptions of neighborhood physical disorder and psychological distress, as measured by depressive symptoms. We employ both continuous and categorical measures of age to test for a potential moderating effect. Overall findings based on linear regression analyses reveal that the mental distress resulting from the perception of physically deteriorating neighborhood declines with age. Stated otherwise, we find that the psychological distress associated with the perception of neighborhood physical disorder is far less pronounced for the young-old (60 years and above) and late-old (70 years and above) adults as compared with their young middle-aged (40–49 years) and late middle-aged (50–59 years) counterparts.