Volume 28, Issue 4: August, 2001

Abstract

DISENTANGLING MEASURES OF INDIVIDUAL PERCEPTIONS OF COMMUNITY SOCIAL DYNAMICS: RESULTS OF A COMMUNITY SURVEY

Edith A. Parker, DrPH, Richard L. Lichtenstein, PhD, Amy J. Schulz, PhD, Barbara A. Israel, DrPH, M. Anthony Schork, PhD, Kenneth J. Steinman, PhD and Sherman A. James, PhD

This study examined how different measures of individual perceptions of community social dynamics relate to each other and how these measures relate to self-reported general health and depressive symptoms. Results of a principal components analysis conducted to investigate the interrelationships between these individual measures suggest that these measures measure separate phenomena. In addition, in results of multiple-regression analyses conducted to examine associations between the various measures of individual perceptions of community social dynamics and the dependent variables of self-reported general health and depressive symptoms, sense of community, perceived neighborhood control, and neighborhood participation were all associated with the outcome variables in separate regression models. In a regression model with these three variables added to control variables, only sense of community was significantly, albeit modestly, associated with depressive symptoms and self-reported general health.