Emotional and behavioral problems in children are associated with a variety of individual and contextual factors, including parenting stress. There is some evidence to indicate that access to the natural environment may also impact these issues in children. The major purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between proximity to city parks, residential greenness, parenting stress, mothers' educational level and demographics on children's emotional and behavioral problems in one city in Lithuania.
The current study was part of a three-wave cohort study with pregnant women. Data were taken from the third wave of interviews, conducted with 1,486 mothers when their children were four to six years old. Variables measured include: parenting stress, children's mental health problems, proximity of residence or kindergarten to city parks, and residential greenness. Demographic information was also collected, including children's and mother's age, child's gender, and mother's educational level and employment status. Data analysis was quantitative; the authors utilized descriptive statistics and standard non-hierarchical linear regression.
Parenting stress significantly impacted children's mental health problems in all models. Study results showed statistically significant relationships between proximity to city parks and total behavioral and emotional problems, including less hyperactivity, fewer peer and conduct problems, and more prosocial behavior among children whose mothers had lower education levels (no college). Therefore, there were positive outcomes for children who lived close to parks and whose mothers had low education levels. Interestingly, these benefits were not found to be significant in this study among children whose mothers had higher education levels. The authors suggest the significant benefit for children of low education mothers may be tied to the stress-reducing benefits associated with access to parks and greenness. Results also indicated that residential greenness was associated with more conduct problems and less prosocial behavior among children whose mothers had higher education levels. The authors suggest that this result likely is not meaningful as there were few differences in greenness between residential areas, and the college-educated working parents in this study may not take the time for their children to access the parks and green areas nearby.
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