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I'll be honest, I don't have time to go dig into this study. Nevertheless, I'm skeptical because I'd be willing to bet cities don't plant trees in the hood. The

I'll be honest, I don't have time to go dig into this study. Nevertheless, I'm skeptical because I'd be willing to bet cities don't plant trees in the hood. There's probably a strong correlation between wealth and living near trees (and of course there's a correlation between wealth and health). I'd be happy to be wrong.

chongli 7y ago
Or perhaps it’s more wealth => more trees (and healthier food, more exercise, less nearby particulate pollution, etc) => better health.
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dpix 7y ago
Exactly what I thought while reading that article. I can't imagine anyway you would be able to run a study and get meaningful results around this accounting for a tonne of external variables. I expect wealthier people tend to live in nicer neighbourhoods that just tend to have more planting, those people are more likely to have better lives than poor people who happen to live in neighborhoods that can't afford to plant a lot of trees. In saying that, I'm still all for planting as many trees in cities as we can. This just seems like a flawed study
grawprog 7y ago
>There's probably a strong correlation between wealth and living near trees Could also have to do with the city's wealth itself. A city that has money to spend on trees, probably has better infrastructure, more jobs available and and just more ways for lower income people to live and thrive than a city that can't afford to plant and maintain trees. Trees are expensive. It means they probably invest more in stuff like accessible transit, maintaining roads and just other general quality of life improvements in the city. I figure trees are probably lower down on the list of things to spend money on, so if they've got the money for that, the city itself is like just a better place to live for a ton of other reasons.
BubRoss 7y ago
Everytime I see one of these articles I immediately wonder if they controlled for all the obvious stronger correlations that are already known.

chongli 7y ago

Or perhaps it’s more wealth => more trees (and healthier food, more exercise, less nearby particulate pollution, etc) => better health.

deleted 7y ago

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dpix 7y ago

Exactly what I thought while reading that article. I can't imagine anyway you would be able to run a study and get meaningful results around this accounting for a tonne of external variables. I expect wealthier people tend to live in nicer neighbourhoods that just tend to have more planting, those people are more likely to have better lives than poor people who happen to live in neighborhoods that can't afford to plant a lot of trees. In saying that, I'm still all for planting as many trees in cities as we can. This just seems like a flawed study

grawprog 7y ago

>There's probably a strong correlation between wealth and living near trees Could also have to do with the city's wealth itself. A city that has money to spend on trees, probably has better infrastructure, more jobs available and and just more ways for lower income people to live and thrive than a city that can't afford to plant and maintain trees. Trees are expensive. It means they probably invest more in stuff like accessible transit, maintaining roads and just other general quality of life improvements in the city. I figure trees are probably lower down on the list of things to spend money on, so if they've got the money for that, the city itself is like just a better place to live for a ton of other reasons.

BubRoss 7y ago

Everytime I see one of these articles I immediately wonder if they controlled for all the obvious stronger correlations that are already known.