Assessing The Contribution Of Urban Play Spaces’ Features For Reducing Obesity In Bandung, Indonesia

• Main Author: Fabyandi (NIM: 25416022), Adnan
• Format: Theses
• Language: Indonesia
• Subjects: Perencanaan wilayah
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/25048
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Obesity has become one of the major problem experienced by people in urban life, especially children in Bandung Municipality. It is classified as major problem because of its high disease burden and evidence indicating a significant correlation between obesity and a wide range of health complications. The idea to prevent the obesity problem can be started with the socio-environmental approach which accommodates children’s physical activity. The socio-environmental aspect used in this research is targeting the built environment to give opportunities for individuals to engage in physical activity. Urban play space such as neighborhood park is the kind of environment to facilitate the energy expenditure activity in the urban life. In order to prevent the obesity issue, it is necessary to investigate and understand the correlation between urban play spaces utilization in accommodating physical activity and the level of obesity represented as children Body Mass Index (BMI) level. This research discovers a positive correlation among the regular physical activities, quantified as frequency to play in urban play space per week and duration to play in 1 playtime, energetic type of activities, and the lower BMI for children in the study area. However, lack of awareness on doing regular physical activity in urban play spaces become a limitation because children and parents as the respondents in this study did not regard this activity as a means of preventing and reducing obesity. In fact, urban play space as part of public space has a “co-benefit” in social aspect especially in accommodating children physical activities to prevent the obesity problem. Therefore, urban play spaces’ features such as accessibility, design, facility, and safety are assessed to understand their contributions for attracting children to do physical activity in the urban play spaces. Using open coding analysis, statistical analysis and spatial analysis, it is understood that accessibility and design have correlation to the children willingness to play in urban play spaces. In addition, it was found that the neighborhood economic condition also has influence to encourage urban play spaces’ utilization for children in the study area. Finally, the role of education is important to raise the awareness to encourage children engage in physical activities in the urban play space which could be initiated in the family and also in the society. <br /> <br /> <br /> Keywords: Urban play space, Physical activity, Obesity, Children, BMI <br />