Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2009, 6(8), 2271-2287; doi:10.3390/ijerph6082271
Article

The Influence of Socioeconomic and Environmental Determinants on Health and Obesity: A West Virginia Case Study

Anura Amarasinghe 1 email, Gerard D’Souza 2,* email, Cheryl Brown 2 email, Hyungna Oh 3 email and Tatiana Borisova 4 email
1 Centre for the Built Environment and Health, School of Population Health, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, Western Australia 6009, Australia 2 Division of Resource Management, West Virginia University, P.O. Box 6108, Morgantown, WV 26505-6108, USA 3 College of Business and Economics, West Virginia University, P.O. Box 6025, Morgantown, WV 26505-6108, USA 4 Food and Resource Economics Department, University of Florida, McCarty Hall A, P.O. Box 110240, Gainesville, FL 32611-0240, USA
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Received: 29 July 2009 / Accepted: 12 August 2009 / Published: 19 August 2009
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Health Economics)
PDF Full-text Download PDF Full-Text [84 KB, uploaded 18 August 2009 21:45 CEST]
Abstract: A recursive system of ordered self assessed health together with BRFSS data were used to investigate health and obesity in the Appalachian state of West Virginia. Implications of unobserved heterogeneity and endogeneity of lifestyle outcomes on health were investigated. Obesity was found to be an endogenous lifestyle outcome associated with impaired health status. Risk of obesity is found to increase at a decreasing rate with per capita income and age. Intervention measures which stimulate human capital development, diet-disease knowledge and careful land use planning may improve health and obesity outcomes in Appalachia in particular and rural America in general.
Keywords: health; obesity; endogeneity; human capital; land use; Appalachia

Article Statistics

Click here to load and display the download statistics.

Cite This Article

MDPI and ACS Style

Amarasinghe, A.; D’Souza, G.; Brown, C.; Oh, H.; Borisova, T. The Influence of Socioeconomic and Environmental Determinants on Health and Obesity: A West Virginia Case Study. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2009, 6, 2271-2287.

AMA Style

Amarasinghe A, D’Souza G, Brown C, Oh H, Borisova T. The Influence of Socioeconomic and Environmental Determinants on Health and Obesity: A West Virginia Case Study. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2009; 6(8):2271-2287.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Amarasinghe, Anura; D’Souza, Gerard; Brown, Cheryl; Oh, Hyungna; Borisova, Tatiana. 2009. "The Influence of Socioeconomic and Environmental Determinants on Health and Obesity: A West Virginia Case Study." Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 6, no. 8: 2271-2287.

Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health EISSN 1660-4601 Published by MDPI AG, Basel, Switzerland RSS E-Mail Table of Contents Alert