Study title

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner. The Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children Study in Scotland, 2022  (HSBC) provides key data on the health and wellbeing of Scottish adolescents and how the health of our young people has changed over 30+ years. HBSC takes a broad perspective, gathering information across a wide range of health and wellbeing domains relevant to young people, focusing on the social contexts in which they are growing up, including school, family, peers and the online environment. The HBSC study focuses on young people attending school aged 11, 13 and 15 years. These age groups cover important stages of physical and emotional development in young people during a period of rapid physical and neurological change from the onset of adolescence to the middle teenage years when key life and career decisions are being made. The survey is administered to a nationally representative sample of pupils from each age group in schools via a self-completion survey. In 2022, data were collected online for the first time. As part of a cross-national study, HBSC also provides the opportunity to compare the health and well-being of Scotland’s adolescents with their peers in over 50 countries across Europe and North America. The first national HBSC survey was conducted in Scotland in 1990, and national surveys have been conducted every four years since then, in line with the cross-national survey cycle. The study protocol and a core part of the survey instrument are common to all countries participating in the international study, providing robust cross-national comparable data on adolescents across Europe and North America. HBSC is conducted in collaboration with the World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe, a partnership which supports the wide dissemination of research findings from the study to inform and influence health improvement policy and practice at national and international levels.Main...