Translating active living research into policy and practice: One important pathway to chronic disease prevention

Abstract

Global concerns about rising levels of chronic disease make timely translation of research into policy and practice a priority. There is a need to tackle common risk factors: tobacco use, unhealthy diets, physical inactivity, and harmful alcohol use. Using evidence to inform policy and practice is challenging, often hampered by a poor fit between academic research and the needs of policymakers and practitioners -notably for active living researchers whose objective is to increase population physical activity by changing the ways cities are designed and built. We propose 10 strategies that may facilitate translation of research into health-enhancing urban planning policy. Strategies include interdisciplinary research teams of policymakers and practitioners; undertaking explicitly policy-relevant research; adopting appropriate study designs and methodologies (evaluation of policy initiatives as 'natural experiments'); and adopting dissemination strategies that include knowledge brokers, advocates, and lobbyists. Conducting more policy-relevant research will require training for researchers as well as different rewards in academia.

What Motivates Stakeholder Groups to Focus on Childhood Obesity Prevention Policies?

“…This is consistent with findings that suggest the promotion and tenure process -which relies in large part on academics' research -does not encourage communicating with policy-makers [34]. Giles-Corti et al have offered several recommendations to better bridge academic research on obesity prevention and engagement with legislators, including the use of interdisciplinary research teams that include public health practitioners and policy-makers and capitalizing on natural experiments that result from the implementation of a given policy [35]. This study's strengths include its geographic diversity and large sample size, but its limitations should be noted.…”

Carrots and sticks vs carrots: Comparing approaches to workplace travel plans using disincentives for driving and incentives for active travel

“…Pragmatic approaches to implementing controlled trials should consider how these interventions are likely to be implemented in the real world by organisations that will receive varying amounts of support from transport and health professionals to develop and implement their workplace travel plans. This intervention research should consider academic discourse on the appropriateness of these study designs in different contexts of implementing population health and transport research (Victora et al, 2004;Melia, 2015), guidance on pragmatic approaches to implementing controlled trials (Zwarenstein et al, 2008) and how this research can be translated to real-world interventions (Zwarenstein et al, 2008;Giles-Corti et al, 2015). Studies of the acceptability of parking management strategies are also needed.…”

“…More published intervention research, including stronger evidence on the overall effectiveness of workplace travel plans for decreasing driving and increasing physical activity is required (Petrunoff et al, 2014). The intervention research should consider academic discourse on the appropriateness of these study designs in different contexts of implementing population health and transport research (Victora et al, 2004;Melia, 2015), guidance on pragmatic approaches to implementing controlled trials (Zwarenstein et al, 2008) and how this research can be translated to real-world interventions (Zwarenstein et al, 2008;Giles-Corti et al, 2015).…”

Economic Value of Parks via Human Mental Health: An Analytical Framework

“…Use of greenspace varies with many local factors (Jones et al, 2009;Lin et al, 2014;McCormack et al, 2014;Veitch et al, 2015). In some cities, these are incorporated in urban planning (Gidlöf-Gunnarsson and Öhrström, 2007;Villeneuve et al, 2012;Alcock et al, 2014;Francis et al, 2015;Giles-Corti et al, 2015;Ulmer et al, 2016).…”