Research team: Professor Catharine Ward Thompson, Professor Peter Aspinall, Simon Bell and Jenny Roe
Keywords: quality of life, health, wellbeing, access, outdoor environment, environmental management, green space
OPENspace Research Centre, in collaboration with the MacAulay Land Use Institute and the University of Glasgow, has been awarded a Scottish Government grant from the Rural and Environment Research and Analysis Directorate (RERAD), as part of the Environment on Human Health (EHH) Initiative. The project will research the relationship between the quality, quantity and accessibility of green space and people’s health and wellbeing. The proposed research aims to test the importance of factors associated with public and individual perceptions of their environment, the actual measure of the environment and measures of its character, as they are directly related to people’s health and wellbeing. These tests will inform assessments of the effects of land and environmental management policies on the provision of environments that are conducive to good public health and wellbeing and the role that quality can play in the benefits that arise from having access to green spaces.
The project will be conducted over 4 years with funding worth just over £1m of which OPENspace will receive £212,000.