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(Table 10, Table 11, Table 12; Charts F and G)
7.1 The interviewer asks the randomly-chosen adult on how many of the previous seven days did he/she make a trip of more than a quarter of a mile by foot (a) to go somewhere such as work, shopping or to see friends (i.e. used walking as a means of transport); and (b) just for the pleasure of walking, or to keep fit or walk a dog. A similar question is asked about cycling.
7.2 Walking
7.2.1 The left-hand side of Table 10 shows that 52% of adults said that, in the previous seven days, they had made a trip of more than a quarter of a mile by foot to go somewhere. There was very little difference between the sexes. The percentage who had walked to go somewhere tended to fall with age, from 71% of people aged 16-19 to just over half of those aged 40-59 and under a third of those aged 80 or over. The percentage was highest for adults in further or higher education (75%), for adults living in MOSAIC "singles and flats" areas (64%) and for adults living in SHS-classified small "remote" towns (61%). It was lowest for those who were permanently sick or disabled (34%), for those in MOSAIC "country dwellers" areas (34%) and for those living in SHS-classified rural areas (38%). There was some variation with the social class of the adult (the percentages for the different classes were between 51% and 65% - the apparent possible inconsistency with the overall figure of 52% is due to the social class being available for only about half the people - see section A.7) but very little variation with income (the percentages for the different income bands were all between 50% and 54%). However, groups for which similar percentages had walked as a means of transport could have different frequencies of so doing. For example, 26% of people from "unskilled" households had walked to go somewhere on 6-7 of the previous seven days, compared with only 16% of adults from "professional" households. Similarly, 17-18% of people from households with an annual net income of up to £10,000 had walked as a means of transport on 6-7 days compared with only 10-11% of those from households with a net income of over £30,000 per year.
7.2.2 The right-hand side of Table 10, and the upper part of Chart F, provide information about walking for pleasure or to keep fit (including walking a dog). 40% of adults said that they had made a trip of more than a quarter of a mile by foot for this purpose in the previous seven days: 44% of men and 37% of women. Chart F shows that the percentages for men and women did not differ much for the younger ages (the figures for men tended to be slightly higher), but from the age of 50 the percentage of men who said that they had walked for pleasure or to keep fit was much higher than the corresponding figure for women. The percentage for men was highest for those aged 65-69.
7.2.3 The percentage reporting that they had walked for pleasure or to keep fit was highest for self-employed people (52%) and lowest for permanently sick or disabled adults (24%). 51% of people with professional, managerial and technical occupations had walked for pleasure or to keep fit, compared with 39% of those in partly-skilled or unskilled occupations. There were also differences between areas: 53% of adults living in MOSAIC "country dweller" areas and 55% of adults in SHS-classified "remote" rural areas had walked for pleasure or to keep fit in the past seven days, compared with 28% of those in MOSAIC "families in council flats" areas and 35% of adults in the SHS-classified city settlements.
7.3 Cycling
7.3.1 Table 11 shows the equivalent results for cycling. Only 3% of adults said that they had cycled as a means of transport in the previous seven days: 4% of men and 2% of women. The percentage was highest for 16-19 year olds (6%), then fell as age increased, to 1% of those aged 80 or over. There appeared to be differences between some of the sub-groups of the population, but these must be interpreted cautiously as they were based (in some cases) on only a few hundred sample cases.
7.3.2 In 1999, 4% of adults said that they had cycled for pleasure or to keep fit in the previous seven days: 5% of men and 3% of women. The lower part of Chart F shows that the percentage for men was higher than that for women for all age-groups. Again, the apparent differences between some of the sub-groups of the population must be interpreted cautiously, as they were based (in some cases) on only a few hundred sample cases.
7.4 Quarterly variation in walking and cycling
7.4.1 Because interviewing takes place throughout the year, one can look at how some of the SHS's results vary within the year. The upper parts of Table 12 and Chart G show the seasonal variation in walking, in terms of the percentages of adults who said that they had made a trip of more than a quarter of a mile by foot on one or more of the previous seven days. Overall, the percentage who had walked as a means of transport did not vary much during 1999: the lowest value was 50.5% for the third quarter (July to September), the highest was the first quarter's 53.4% - a range of less than three percentage points. There was greater variation in the percentage who had walked for pleasure or to keep fit: the lowest figure was the fourth quarter's 35.6%, the highest was the second quarter's 43.8% - a range of over eight percentage points. The lower parts of the table and the chart show the equivalent figures for cycling: the percentage who said that they had cycled as a means of transport did not change much during the year (between 2.5% and 4.0% - a range of only 1.5 percentage points), but there was greater variation in the percentage who cycled for pleasure or to keep fit (from the fourth quarter's 2.7% to the third quarter's 5.4% - a range of 2.7 percentage points).
7.4.2 The more detailed parts of Table 12 show how the percentages varied during the year for different sub-groups of the population - figures which must be used with caution, in some cases, because of the small underlying sample numbers: apparent changes between the quarters for a sub-group could well be due to, or exaggerated by, the effects of sampling variability.
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