Can We Reverse this Trend? Exploring Health and Risk Behaviours of Grade 12 Cohorts of Ontario Students from 2013–2019

Abstract

Adolescents engage in multiple health risk behaviours that put them at risk of future chronic disease. By the time students graduate from secondary school, they may be engaging in behaviours that set them on a particular health trajectory. It is important to monitor the co-occurrence of health risk behaviours of cohorts of grade 12 students over time to highlight important areas for intervention. The purpose of this study was to examine trends in health and risk behaviours over six waves among subsequent cohorts of grade twelve students from Ontario, Canada. A total of 44,740 grade 12 students participated in the COMPASS study across the six waves (2013/14 to 2018/19), and self-reported movement (physical activity, screen time, sleep), dietary (fruit and vegetables, breakfast), and substance use (smoking, vaping, binge drinking, and cannabis use) behaviours. Over 91.0% of students reported engaging in three or more health risk behaviours, with increases in the number of students reporting inadequate sleep, not eating breakfast on every school day, and vaping over time. Although modest, the wave 6 cohort reported slightly more risk behaviours compared with the wave 1 cohort, highlighting the importance of multidimensional health promotion strategies across multiple settings.

A Comparison of Meeting Physical Activity and Screen Time Recommendations between Canadian Youth Living in Rural and Urban Communities: A Nationally Representative Cross-Sectional Analysis

“…Furthermore, current evidence [ 20 ] and trends suggest that the prevalence of insufficient PA and high screen time among youth may, at best be stable or increasing [ 21 , 22 , 23 ] over time, thus, it is important to understand ifs the previously observed differences in self-reported PA adherence between urban and rural youth remain or have increased. Using data from the 2017–2018 CCHS, this study compared the odds of meeting independent and combined PA and screen time recommendations between Canadian youth aged 12 to 17 years living in urban versus rural communities.…”

Explaining long-term trends in adolescent emotional problems: what we know from population-based studies

“…For example, in the US, in 2015 more than 40% of adolescents reported sleeping less than seven hours on a typical night [87]. Very large surveys of young people in Europe [11,88], North America [89][90][91][92], and Japan [93] suggest that the last two decades have seen an increase in the proportion of young people who sleep for durations considered insufficient. This follows reductions in sleep duration over the course of the 20th Century [94].…”

Who Is Able to Resist What Is Forbidden?—The Relationship between Health Literacy and Risk Behaviours in Secondary School Students in the Broader Social and Educational Context

“…The literature calls these ‘forbidden activities’ risk behaviours (RB), and among them lists smoking, drinking, early sexual activity and using marijuana [ 8 ]. The unfavourable effect that these activities have on the health and well-being of adolescents has been proved numerous times, but young people still engage in various RB, and this is an increasing trend [ 9 ]. Analysing the factors that either drive adolescents into RB or inhibit those behaviours is still relevant [ 10 ].…”