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Indoor time–microenvironment–activity patterns in seven regions of Europe

Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology volume 17, pages 170–181 (2007)Cite this article

Abstract

Personal exposure to environmental substances is largely determined by time–microenvironment–activity patterns while moving across locations or microenvironments. Therefore, time–microenvironment–activity data are particularly useful in modeling exposure. We investigated determinants of workday time–microenvironment–activity patterns of the adult urban population in seven European cities. The EXPOLIS study assessed workday time–microenvironment–activity patterns among a total of 1427 subjects (age 19–60 years) in Helsinki (Finland), Athens (Greece), Basel (Switzerland), Grenoble (France), Milan (Italy), Prague (Czech Republic), and Oxford (UK). Subjects completed time–microenvironment–activity diaries during two working days. We present time spent indoors — at home, at work, and elsewhere, and time exposed to tobacco smoke indoors for all cities. The contribution of sociodemographic factors has been assessed using regression models. More than 90% of the variance in indoor time–microenvironment–activity patterns originated from differences between and within subjects rather than between cities. The most common factors that were associated with indoor time–microenvironment–activity patterns, with similar contributions in all cities, were the specific work status, employment status, whether the participants were living alone, and whether the participants had children at home. Gender and season were associated with indoor time–microenvironment–activity patterns as well but the effects were rather heterogeneous across the seven cities. Exposure to second-hand tobacco smoke differed substantially across these cities. The heterogeneity of these factors across cities may reflect city-specific characteristics but selection biases in the sampled local populations may also explain part of the findings. Determinants of time–microenvironment–activity patterns need to be taken into account in exposure assessment, epidemiological analyses, exposure simulations, as well as in the development of preventive strategies that focus on time–microenvironment–activity patterns that ultimately determine exposures.

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Acknowledgements

EXPOLIS-INDEX is supported by CEFIC-LRI Contract # NMALRI-A3.3UBAS-0207 BIS and based on EXPOLIS (EU contracts ENV4-CT96-0202 (all centers) and ERB IC20-CT96-0061 (Prague), Academy of Finland contract No 36586, intramural KTL projects n:os 2169, 2127 (Helsinki), Bundesamt für Bildung und Wissenschaft BBW Nr. 95.0894; Schweizerischer Nationalfonds 32-048922.96 (Basel); Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich (ETHZ), (Departement Umweltnaturwissenschaften Position Nr. 47112), French Department of Environment (contract 96096), French National Environment Agency (ADEME contract 9693035), Union Routière de France and Grenoble Communauté de Communes (Grenoble), DEFRA Contract EPG1/5/106 (UK), other national research funds, and intramural funding from the participating institutes). N. Künzli and W. Gauderman are supported by the Southern California Environmental Health Sciences Center (National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Grant P30 ES07048).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Preventive Medicine, Division of Environmental Health, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA

    Christian Schweizer, William James Gauderman & Nino Künzli

  2. Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland

    Christian Schweizer & Lucy Bayer-Oglesby

  3. Environmental Health, Science and Policy, University of California at Irvine, Irvine, California, USA

    Rufus David Edwards

  4. Department of Environmental Hygiene, KTL, Kuopio, Finland

    Vito Ilacqua & Matti Juhani Jantunen

  5. Imperial College, London, UK

    Hak Kan Lai & Mark Nieuwenhuijsen

  6. ICREA and Institut Municipal d'Investigació Medica (IMIM), Barcelona, Spain

    Nino Künzli

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  1. Christian Schweizer
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Correspondence to Nino Künzli.

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Schweizer, C., Edwards, R., Bayer-Oglesby, L. et al. Indoor time–microenvironment–activity patterns in seven regions of Europe. J Expo Sci Environ Epidemiol 17, 170–181 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.jes.7500490

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