IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v16y2019i16p2983-d259041.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Impact of Particulate Matter on Outdoor Activity and Mental Health: A Matching Approach

Author

Listed:
  • Miyeon Jung

    (College of Business, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 85 Hoegiro Dongdaemoon-gu, Seoul 02455, Korea)

  • Daegon Cho

    (College of Business, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, 85 Hoegiro Dongdaemoon-gu, Seoul 02455, Korea)

  • Kwangsoo Shin

    (Department of Bio-Medical Convergence, College of Medicine, Chungbuk National University, 1 Chungdae-ro, Seowin-gu, Cheongju-si 28644, Korea)

Abstract

Exposure to air pollution affects human activity and health. Particularly, in Asian countries, the influence of particulate matter on humans has received wide attention. However, there is still a lack of research about the effects of particulate matter on human outdoor activities and mental health. Therefore, we aimed to explore the association between exposure to particulate matter with a diameter of less than 10 µm (PM10) and outdoor activity along with mental health in South Korea where issues caused by particulate matter increasingly have social and economic impacts. We examined this relationship by combining the physical and habitual factors of approximately 100,000 people in 2015 from the Korean National Health Survey. To measure each individual’s exposure to particulate matter, we computed the total hours exposed to a high PM10 concentration (>80 μg/m 3 ) in a given district one month before the survey was conducted. After dividing all districts into six groups according to the exposed level of the high PM10, we applied the propensity score-weighting method to control for observable background characteristics. We then estimated the impact of the high PM10 on outdoor activity and mental health between the weighted individuals in each group. Our main findings suggest that the impact of PM10 on outdoor activity and stress shows an inverted-U shaped function, which is counterintuitive. Specifically, both outdoor activity and stress levels tend to be worsened when the exposure time to a high PM10 (>80 μg/m 3 ) was more than 20 h. Related policy implications are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Miyeon Jung & Daegon Cho & Kwangsoo Shin, 2019. "The Impact of Particulate Matter on Outdoor Activity and Mental Health: A Matching Approach," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(16), pages 1-17, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:16:p:2983-:d:259041
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/16/2983/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/16/2983/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lavy, Victor & Ebenstein, Avraham & Roth, Sefi, 2014. "The Impact of Short Term Exposure to Ambient Air Pollution on Cognitive Performance and Human Capital Formation," CEPR Discussion Papers 10302, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Neidell, Matthew J., 2004. "Air pollution, health, and socio-economic status: the effect of outdoor air quality on childhood asthma," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(6), pages 1209-1236, November.
    3. Joshua Graff Zivin & Matthew Neidell, 2012. "The Impact of Pollution on Worker Productivity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(7), pages 3652-3673, December.
    4. Qingkun Song & David C. Christiani & XiaorongWang & Jun Ren, 2014. "The Global Contribution of Outdoor Air Pollution to the Incidence, Prevalence, Mortality and Hospital Admission for Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-11, November.
    5. Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2002. "Inverse probability weighted M-estimators for sample selection, attrition, and stratification," Portuguese Economic Journal, Springer;Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestao, vol. 1(2), pages 117-139, August.
    6. Wooldridge, Jeffrey M., 2007. "Inverse probability weighted estimation for general missing data problems," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 141(2), pages 1281-1301, December.
    7. Di Novi, Cinzia, 2013. "The indirect effect of fine particulate matter on health through individuals’ life-style," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 27-36.
    8. Cohen, Barney, 2006. "Urbanization in developing countries: Current trends, future projections, and key challenges for sustainability," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 63-80.
    9. Ok-Jin Kim & Sun-Young Kim & Ho Kim, 2017. "Association between Long-Term Exposure to Particulate Matter Air Pollution and Mortality in a South Korean National Cohort: Comparison across Different Exposure Assessment Approaches," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-14, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kyungsoo Kim & Il-Youp Kwak & Hyunjin Min, 2021. "Particulate Matter 10 (PM 10 ) Is Associated with Epistaxis in Children and Adults," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(9), pages 1-10, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Clara Kögel, 2022. "The impact of air pollution on labour productivity in France," Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne 22020, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne.
    2. Fu, Shihe & Viard, V. Brian & Zhang, Peng, 2022. "Trans-boundary air pollution spillovers: Physical transport and economic costs by distance," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 155(C).
    3. Min Zhang & Mark D. Partridge & Huasheng Song, 2020. "Amenities and the geography of innovation: evidence from Chinese cities," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 65(1), pages 105-145, August.
    4. Mengmeng Guo & Shihe Fu, 2019. "Running With a Mask? The Effect of Air Pollution on Marathon Runners’ Performance," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 20(7), pages 903-928, October.
    5. Fu, Shihe & Guo, Mengmeng, 2017. "Running with a Mask? The Effect of Air Pollution on Marathon Runners’ Performance," MPRA Paper 79473, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Anthony Heyes & Nicholas Rivers & Brandon Schaufele, 2016. "Politicians, Pollution and Performance in the Workplace: The Effect of PM on MPs," Working Papers 1616E, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    7. Ruoxuan Xiong & Allison Koenecke & Michael Powell & Zhu Shen & Joshua T. Vogelstein & Susan Athey, 2021. "Federated Causal Inference in Heterogeneous Observational Data," Papers 2107.11732, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2023.
    8. Ziebarth, N. R. & Schmitt, M. & Karlsson, M., 2013. "The short-term population health effects of weather and pollution: implications of climate change," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 13/34, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    9. Colmer, Jonathan & Lin, Dajun & Liu, Siying & Shimshack, Jay, 2021. "Why are pollution damages lower in developed countries? Insights from high-Income, high-particulate matter Hong Kong," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    10. Martin Huber, 2012. "Identification of Average Treatment Effects in Social Experiments Under Alternative Forms of Attrition," Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics, , vol. 37(3), pages 443-474, June.
    11. Laszlo Goerke & Markus Pannenberg, 2005. "Severance Pay and the Shadow of the Law: Evidence for West Germany," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 541, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    12. Villalobos Barría, Carlos & Klasen, Stephan, 2016. "The impact of SENAI's vocational training program on employment, wages, and mobility in Brazil: Lessons for Sub Saharan Africa?," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 74-96.
    13. Lu, Yi & Tao, Zhigang, 2009. "Contract enforcement and family control of business: Evidence from China," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 597-609, December.
    14. Stefan Boes & Stephan Nüesch & Steven Stillman, 2013. "Aircraft Noise, Health, And Residential Sorting: Evidence From Two Quasi‐Experiments," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(9), pages 1037-1051, September.
    15. Guido W. Imbens & Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2009. "Recent Developments in the Econometrics of Program Evaluation," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 5-86, March.
    16. Rafael Perez Ribas & Fabio Veras Soares & Clarissa Gondim Teixeira & Elydia Silva & Guilherme Issamu Hirata, 2010. "Beyond Cash: Assessing Externality and Behaviour Effects of Non-Experimental Cash Transfers," Working Papers 65, International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth.
    17. Kline, Patrick, 2014. "A note on variance estimation for the Oaxaca estimator of average treatment effects," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 122(3), pages 428-431.
    18. Ha Trong Nguyen & Huong Thu Le & Luke B Connelly, 2021. "Weather and children's time allocation," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(7), pages 1559-1579, July.
    19. Prokhorov, Artem & Schmidt, Peter, 2009. "GMM redundancy results for general missing data problems," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 151(1), pages 47-55, July.
    20. Jiang, Dequan & Li, Weiping & Shen, Yongjian & Zhang, Ying, 2022. "Does air quality affect firms’ investment efficiency? Evidence from China," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 1-17.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:16:p:2983-:d:259041. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.