Janet Shucksmith

Young People's Leisure and Lifestyles

List of Illustrations. Acknowledgements. Adolescence and adolescent lifestyles. The young peoples leisure and lifestyles project. Young people and leisure. Young people and sport. School and work. Young people and families Young people, peers and friends. Young people and health. Developing lifestyles in adolescence. Some concluding thoughts. Appendix: Panel Study Areas - types of environment. Bibliography. Name Index. Subject Index.

Social class and adolescent smoking behaviour

The paper examines class based differences in smoking behaviour in middle and later adolescence. The analyses are based on questionnaire survey data drawn from a longitudinal study of adolescent socialisation, leisure and lifestyles in Scotland. Perhaps surprisingly, the social class of the family is found to have little relationship to smoking in middle and later adolescence. By contrast, marked variations in smoking are evident with respect to the current socio-economic position occupied by young people themselves in middle and later adolescence. The connections between smoking, social class background, and current social class position are examined through a consideration of inter-generational occupational mobility, and once more a clear pattern of differences is found. Thus, we conclude that there is an emergent pattern of class based differences in adolescent smoking behaviour, as young people make the transition towards adulthood. We consider the possible role that factors from the family, the peer group, and the school contexts may play in the production of these differences in smoking behaviour. We also highlight the importance that our findings may have for the health inequalities debate, and particularly for explanations which link the production of class based differences in health to processes of inter-generational mobility.

Lifestyle, health and social class in adolescence

The paper considers mechanisms for indirect health selection in adolescence, as part of the explanation for health inequalities between social groups. Aspects of adolescent lifestyles are identified as potentially important factors for the production of class based differences in adult health status. Survey data from a Scottish longitudinal study of adolescent socialization and lifestyles are utilized in order to locate such health lifestyle factors within the wider contexts of the individuals personal and social environment at this stage of the life cycle. Relationships and attitudes to family, school and peers in middle adolescence at 15-16 years of age are first examined, and distinctive patterns of integration within these contexts are identified. The inter-connections between these broader aspects of lifestyle, social class and individual health behaviours are then examined. Mid-adolescent patterns of social integration are found to have a clear structural basis, and most importantly, they anticipate social position in later adolescence at 17-18 years of age. It is also found that such patterns of integration into the family, peer and school contexts are linked to subsequent health related behaviours and to self assessed health in later adolescence, and that these links are independent of the young persons social class background. Thus, we conclude that behavioural--cultural lifestyle factors, when these are located within a broader social context, provide a clear and plausible mechanism for indirect health selection in adolescence.

Adolescence and health inequalities: Extensions to macintyre and west

The paper investigates class based health inequalities in mid to late adolescence. Health status is assessed by means of three subjective self-report measures; evaluation of general health, psychological well-being and disability/long-standing illness. Using six measures of social class (three occupationally and three non-occupationally based) which derive from parental characteristics, no evidence for consistent class based differentials in health amongst adolescents is found. However, it is not concluded that class based health inequalities are absent at this stage of the life cycle. Instead, it is argued that the above measures of social class differentiate between young people on the basis of the socio-economic status of their parents. As such they fail to allow for the possibility that variations in the current social position of young people themselves may have important consequences for their health. Current social position is assessed in terms of economic activity status, occupation and educational attainment. Using these measures, class based health inequalities are indeed found. Extending the analysis further, the relationship between social class of origin, current social circumstances and self-assessed health status is investigated by considering inter-generational occupational mobility. Again, evidence for class based health inequalities is found.

Keep a cool head: drug education in primary schools

Presents and discusses the findings of a study undertaken in 1997. The work was intended to inform the development of new initiatives to present drug education to primary schoolchildren aged 8‐12, but which, specifically, would foster parent‐child interaction in relation to drug‐related issues. The study findings indicated that children, parents and teachers are clearly convinced that drug education does have a place in the upper stages of primary school. Parents and teachers supported drug education that took cognisance of the partial knowledge that children possess and was skill based. Results do not indicate approval for a radical programme of parent involvement, but suggest instead an intervention which builds on the existing contractual commitment to consult parents. Two types of resources suggested were a staff development package for teachers giving ideas on how to introduce drug education in the primary school and materials geared to teachers with an existing commitment to drug education.