Using Internet Search Queries to Assess Public Awareness of the Healthy Cities Approach: A Case Study in Shenzhen, China

Jun Yang, Yutong Zhang, Yixiong Xiao, Shaoqing Shen, Mo Su, Yuqi Bai, Jingbo Zhou and Peng Gong
Additional contact information
Jun Yang: Key Laboratory of Urban Land Resources Monitoring and Simulation, Ministry of Natural Resources, Shen-zhen 518034, China
Yutong Zhang: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Yixiong Xiao: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Shaoqing Shen: Shenzhen Research Center of Digital City Engineering, Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Planning and Natural Resource Management, Shenzhen 518034, China
Mo Su: School of Resource and Environment Science, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
Yuqi Bai: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
Jingbo Zhou: Business Intelligence Lab, Baidu Research, Baidu Inc., Beijing 100193, China
Peng Gong: Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System Modeling, Department of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 8, 1-13

Abstract: Cities around the globe are embracing the Healthy Cities approach to address urban health challenges. Public awareness is vital for successfully deploying this approach but is rarely assessed. In this study, we used internet search queries to evaluate the public awareness of the Healthy Cities approach applied in Shenzhen, China. The overall situation at the city level and the intercity variations were both analyzed. Additionally, we explored the factors that might affect the internet search queries of the Healthy Cities approach. Our results showed that the public awareness of the approach in Shenzhen was low. There was a high intercity heterogeneity in terms of interest in the various components of the Healthy Cities approach. However, we did not find a significant effect of the selected demographic, environmental, and health factors on the search queries. Based on our findings, we recommend that the city raise public awareness of healthy cities and take actions tailored to health concerns in different city zones. Our study showed that internet search queries can be a valuable data source for assessing the public awareness of the Healthy Cities approach.

Keywords: healthy city; health needs; internet search; outreach; public awareness (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/8/4264/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/8/4264/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:18:y:2021:i:8:p:4264-:d:538028

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().