A comprehensive GPS-based analysis of activity spaces in early and late pregnancy using the ActMAP framework

Health Place. 2025 Jan 16:91:103413. doi: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2025.103413. Online ahead of print.

Abstract

Health implications of mobility during pregnancy entail a need to understand pregnant women's activity spaces. We present ActMAP, a framework for quantifying multiple aspects of activity spaces from distinct trips and stays derived from GPS data. We applied ActMAP to data from 238 pregnant women in Barcelona, Spain (2018-2020) and explored weekday, weekend and intraday associations between pregnancy trimester and activity spaces. Activities were more centred around the home later in pregnancy. However, the number of visited places and daily trips remained largely constant throughout pregnancy. By constructing activity spaces from individual trips and stays, ActMAP could provide a framework for GPS-based holistic assessments of mobility.

Keywords: Active travel; Cohort; Location tracking; Spatiotemporal method; Urban environment.