Friday, March 21, 2008

Surevy Shows Decreased Risky Behavior by Youth

(FRANKFORT, Ky.) – Data from the most recent Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) show that fewer Kentucky high school students are engaging in negative behaviors than in 2003.

The data was gathered in 2007 through the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance Survey.

The YRBS measures what the CDC defines as the Six Critical Health Behaviors of Adolescents:
· alcohol and drug use
· injury and violence (including suicide)
· tobacco use
· nutrition
· physical activity
· sexual risk behaviors

Developed in 1992, the YRBS includes national, state and local school-based surveys of representative samples of 9th- through 12th-grade students. These surveys are conducted every two years, usually during the spring semester. The national survey, conducted by CDC, provides data representative of high school students in public and private schools in the United States. The state and local surveys, conducted by departments of health and education, provide data representative of public high school students in each state or local school district.

In Kentucky, the YRBS is given to a randomly selected sample of high school students. The data is reported as statewide totals only.

Highlights of the YRBS include:

Alcohol and Drug Use
· The percentage of students who had at least one drink of alcohol one or more days during their lifetime has decreased from 76.7 % in 2003 to 71.7% in 2007.
· The percentage of students who used marijuana one or more times during their lifetime has decreased from 43.3% in 2003 to 35.0% in 2007.

Injury and Violence
· The percentage of students who rode one or more times during the past 30 days in a car or other vehicle driven by someone who had been drinking alcohol decreased from 25.5% in 2003 to 20.3% in 2007.
· The percentage of students who carried a weapon such as a gun, knife or club on one or more of the past 30 days has increased from 18.5% in 2003 to 24.4% in 2007.
· The percentage of students who had been threatened or injured with a weapon such as a gun, knife or club on school property on one or more times during the past 12 months has increased from 5.2% in 2003 to 8.3% in 2007.

Tobacco Use
· The percentage of students who ever tried cigarette smoking has decreased from 71.1% in 2003 to 62.2% in 2007.
· The percentage of students who smoked cigarettes on school property on one or more of the past 30 days has decreased from 14.3% in 2003 to 9.5% in 2007.

Nutrition
· The percentage of students who were at risk of becoming overweight in 2007 is 16.4%, which isn’t a statistically significant change from 2003.
· The percentage of students who were overweight in 2007 is 15.6%, which isn’t a statistically significant change from 2003.

Physical Activity
· In 2007, 32.9% of students were physically active for a total of at least 60 minutes per day on five or more of the past seven days.
· The percentage of students who attended physical education classes on one or more days in an average week when they were in school was 34.9% in 2003 and 31.0% in 2007. This is not a statistically significant change, but the percentages are moving down.

Sexual Risk Behaviors
· The percentage of students who ever had sexual intercourse in 2007 is 50.3%, not a significant change from 2003.
· Among students who had sexual intercourse during the past three months, the percentage that used a condom during last sexual intercourse is 59.0%, down from 61.7% in 2003 (not a statistically significant change).

The 2007 data is available on the Kentucky Department of Education’s Web site at http://www.education.ky.gov/KDE/Administrative+Resources/School+Health/Kentucky+YRBS+Survey.htm. The full CDC report will be made available online by mid-summer 2008 at http://www.cdc.gov/HealthyYouth/yrbs/index.htm.


SOURCE: KDE press release

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