UCL open environment最新文献

The disproportional burden of coronavirus (COVID-19) and vulnerability to containment measures in informal settlements have been recognised; however, the role of poor housing conditions in propagating these remains neglected. Poor housing conditions makes it difficult to effectively implement social distancing measures. With increased time spent in cramped, dark and uncomfortable indoor environments, water and sanitation outside the home, and no outdoor space, higher exposure to existing health hazards and high levels of stress, with women and children being most vulnerable, are anticipated. Through this commentary paper, we reflect on these interconnections and recommend immediate measures and the long-term need for adequate housing for health and well-being.

This paper discusses community participation drawing on ongoing disaster recovery and preparedness projects (RPP) in the communities affected by the Heavy Rain Event of 2018 in western Japan. Participatory approaches have become a mainstream methodology for community-based disaster risk reduction (DRR) as advocated in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030. The majority of participation research addresses either 'success' factors for participation or the types of participation. The paper proposes a notion of 'widening participation' in addressing the challenge of attracting people to participate in preparedness initiatives. Originally widening participation was a higher education policy in the UK aiming to broaden the demographic composition of the student base. Even the RPP that are publicly recognised as 'good practices' struggle to recruit more people for the projects. Borrowing the notion of widening participation, the paper identifies how each project encourages non-participants to get involved in the project activities. The paper applies the EAST framework (Easy, Attractive, Social, Timely) widely utilised in the policy making of widening participation and further public services. Rather than providing the public with information and guidance, 'easy', 'attractive', 'social' and 'timely' behavioural approaches tend to enable participation. Examining these four principles in the four cases of RPP, the paper suggests that the EAST framework is feasible in strengthening the strategies for widening participation in preparedness action. The paper, however, recognises a need to address the difference between top-down public policies and bottom-up community projects in the application of the framework.

To reduce carbon emissions, urgent change is needed to high-carbon human behaviours including home energy use. Previous policy failures point to insufficient integration of systemic and behavioural approaches which are too often seen as alternative and incompatible approaches to bring about change. A novel behavioural systems mapping approach was used to inform national policy recommendations for energy-saving retrofit of homes in Wales. Three participatory workshops were held with the independent Welsh residential decarbonisation advisory group ('the Advisory Group') to: (1) map relationships between actors, behaviours and influences on behaviour within the home retrofit system; (2) provide training in the Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) framework and (3) use these to develop policy recommendations for interventions. Recommendations were analysed using the capability, opportunity and motivation (COM-B) model of behaviour to assess whether they addressed these factors. Two behavioural systems maps (BSMs) were produced, representing privately rented and owner-occupied housing tenures. The main causal pathways and feedback loops in each map are described. Necessary interventions to achieve national-scale retrofit included: government-led investment, campaigns and awareness-building, financial-sector funding mechanisms, enforcement of regulations and creating more streamlined and trusted supply chain services. Of 27 final policy recommendations, six addressed capability, 24 opportunity and 12 motivation. Participatory behavioural systems mapping can be used in conjunction with behaviour change frameworks to develop policy recommendations that address the behavioural determinants of complex environmental problems in a systemic way. Research is underway to refine and extend the approach through application to other sustainability challenges and methods of constructing systems maps.

Loneliness has been reported by the UCL-Penn Global COVID Study participants throughout the pandemic year, not surprisingly, although this has been an issue that has been manifesting itself even before the pandemic. In identifying loneliness in communities, the built environment industry and professionals have been looking at how good and targeted design in the public realm and master planning can help to firstly design interventions and secondly orchestrate or manage these spaces in a way that helps create opportunities to address loneliness. Furthermore, how these spaces create opportunities for people to both interact with each other but also interact with the space can help connect people together and with nature/biodiversity. In doing so this also helps to create better health outcomes for mental health and wellbeing, as well as physical health and wellbeing. Coronavirus (Covid-19) and the associated lockdown periods have caused people to reconnect with local green spaces and has focused the attention to what these spaces provide in terms of opportunities and benefits for people. As a result, the value placed on these and the expectation of how they will provide value to communities is increasing and will continue to increase in the post-Covid-19 world. Better connected, activated and well-structured public realm and green spaces will be central to the development of projects and schemes for housing, and mixed used schemes in the forthcoming years.

The main objective of this article is to comment on the findings presented during the UCL-Penn Global Covid Study webinar, 'Family Life: Stress, Relationship Conflict and Child Adjustment' by Portnoy and colleagues. The study examined the ways in which family stress conflict has been affected by the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. Informed by the transactional models of parent-child behaviour, the authors are specifically interested in exploring the effect of child adjustment on parental outcomes. The study, currently under consideration for publication, found that child emotional and conduct problems predicted changes in parental depression and stress during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic. Child hyperactivity predicted parental stress, but not depression. None of the child behaviour problems (emotional problems, conduct problems and hyperactivity) predicted parental relational conflict. This article discusses reasons why the study under consideration did not find a significant effect on relational conflict and posts questions that can be addressed in future studies.

In April 2010, a fatal explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico resulted in the largest marine oil spill in history. This research describes the association of oil exposure with anxiety after the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and evaluates effect modification by self-mastery, emotional support and cleanup participation. To assess the impacts of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) conducted the Gulf States Population Survey (GSPS), a random-digit-dial telephone cross-sectional survey completed between December 2010 and December 2011 with 38,361 responses in four different Gulf Coast states: Louisiana, Florida, Alabama and Mississippi. Anxiety severity was measured using the Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD) symptom inventory. We used Tobit regression to model underlying anxiety as a function of oil exposure and hypothesised effect modifiers, adjusting for socio-demographics. Latent anxiety was higher among those with direct contact with oil than among those who did not have direct contact with oil in confounder-adjusted models [β = 2.84, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.78, 4.91]. Among individuals with direct contact with oil, there was no significant interaction between participating in cleanup activities and emotional support for anxiety (p = 0.20). However, among those with direct contact with oil, in confounder-adjusted models, participation in oil spill cleanup activities was associated with lower latent anxiety (β = -3.55, 95% CI: -6.15, -0.95). Oil contact was associated with greater anxiety, but this association appeared to be mitigated by cleanup participation.

Sustainable, resilient urban water management is fundamental to good environmental and public health. As an interdisciplinary task, it faces enormous challenges from project complexity, network dynamics and the tacit nature of knowledge being communicated between actors involved in design, decisions and delivery. Among others, some critical and persistent challenges to the implementation of sustainable urban water management include the lack of knowledge and expertise, lack of effective communication and collaboration, and lack of shared understanding and context. Using the Chinese Sponge City programme as a case study, this paper draws on the perspectives of Polanyi and Collins to investigate the extent to which knowledge can be used and exchanged between actors. Using Collins' conceptualisation of the terrain of tacit knowledge, the study identifies the use of relational, somatic and collective tacit knowledge (CTK) in the Sponge City pilot project. Structured interviews with 38 people working on a Sponge City pilot project provided data that was rigorously analysed using qualitative thematic analysis. The paper is original in identifying different types of tacit knowledge in urban water management, and the potential pathways for information and messages being communicated between actors. The methods and results provide the groundwork for analysing the access and mobilisation of tacit knowledge in the Sponge City pilot project, with relevance for other complex, interdisciplinary environmental projects and programmes.

Human behaviour change is necessary to meet targets set by the Paris Agreement to mitigate climate change. Restrictions and regulations put in place globally to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 during 2020 have had a substantial impact on everyday life, including many carbon-intensive behaviours such as transportation. Changes to transportation behaviour may reduce carbon emissions. Behaviour change theory can offer perspective on the drivers and influences of behaviour and shape recommendations for how policy-makers can capitalise on any observed behaviour changes that may mitigate climate change. For this commentary, we aimed to describe changes in data relating to transportation behaviours concerning working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic across the Netherlands, Sweden and the UK. We display these identified changes in a concept map, suggesting links between the changes in behaviour and levels of carbon emissions. We consider these changes in relation to a comprehensive and easy to understand model of behaviour, the Opportunity, Motivation Behaviour (COM-B) model, to understand the capabilities, opportunities and behaviours related to the observed behaviour changes and potential policy to mitigate climate change. There is now an opportunity for policy-makers to increase the likelihood of maintaining pro-environmental behaviour changes by providing opportunities, improving capabilities and maintaining motivation for these behaviours.

This discussant commentary considers the findings presented from the UCL-Penn Global COVID Study webinar 'Let's Talk! What do you need to recover from Covid-19?' and published in Wong et al's article in this journal, Reflections, Resilience, and Recovery, drawing into focus the support required to recover from the changes in people's mental health, physical health and relationships brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic. Acknowledging the importance of not making broad generalisations about the effect of the lockdown allows us to see individuals in their own context and their own particular challenges. As we emerge from the Covid-19 pandemic, we need to use the lessons from this study as the foundations for building resilience against future pandemics.