Study Aims

The 11 to 16 Study aimed to address a number of questions:

• What is the socio-demographic (particularly social class and gender) patterning of health and health behaviours (e.g. smoking or exercise) in early (age 11) to mid (ages 13 and 15) adolescence, and if patterns differ by age, what are the processes bringing about such change?
• Is there variation in health and health behaviours between secondary schools which cannot be explained by individual level variables (that is, by a teenager's own characteristics, such as their own socioeconomic position)?
• How do perceptions of the future impact on current health, health behaviours and lifestyles?

The aims of 16+ were:

• To document rates of physical and mental health problems, and health behaviours in late adolescence (age 18-20);
• To examine the socio-demographic factors (particularly social class and gender) which are associated with, or precede health problems and health behaviours, and to study changes in their relationship from early to late adolescence;
• To examine the processes behind such relationships with particular reference to earlier influences arising from the family and school, and current influences arising from labour market position, lifestyles and youth culture;
• To examine the relationships between labour market position and health, health behaviours and lifestyles;
• To compare changes over time in the health, and the factors associated with health, of young people in the same geographical area, this being achieved by comparison with another cohort (the West of Scotland Twenty-07 Study)surveyed 12 years earlier.