Lay summary
Regular physical activity is recommended to promote health, but maintenance of such behaviour has been identified as a major challenge to exercise programmes. Active travel represents a relatively simple way of incorporating exercise into daily life and is more likely to be well adopted and sustained. Car use, on the other hand, is a significant contributor of daily sedentary time. While active travel has been shown to improve health, the evidence to date is limited in terms of more specific health conditions (physical, mental and cognitive) and underlying mechanisms. This fellowship will therefore fill this important gap in knowledge by using the data from UK Biobank, GWAS studies, Statistics New Zealand’s Integrated Data Infrastructure (IDI) and Taupo Bicycle Study. The findings will be of high relevance to the entire population in New Zealand, one of the most car-dependent countries in the world and specifically to Māori.