Open AccessA study on health risk behavior of mid-adolescent school students in a rural and an urban area of West Bengal, India
Author(s) -
N. R. Das,
Dipankar Chattopadhyay,
Sajib Chakraborty,
Aparajita Dasgupta,
Fasihul Akbar
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
archives of medicine and health sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2321-6085
pISSN - 2321-4848
DOI - 10.4103/2321-4848.171906
Subject(s) - medicine , west bengal , vulnerability (computing) , environmental health , rural area , health risk , hygiene , demography , interview , personal hygiene , socioeconomics , family medicine , computer security , pathology , sociology , computer science , political science , law
Background and Objective: High-risk behaviors can have adverse effects on health of adolescents. It is essential to identify risks so that modification can be initiated before any damage. The present study was conducted among adolescents to study their risk behaviors. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional descriptive study based on the concept of Global School-based Student Health Survey was conducted by interviewing adolescents of one urban and one rural randomly selected school. For quick overall assessment of their risk behaviors, a predesigned three-point scoring system was followed. Data were analyzed using Epi Info version 3.5.1. Results: The study of six domains of important risk behaviors among 788 school-going adolescents (rural: 436 [55.3%], urban: 352 [44.7%]), (male: 406 [51.5%], female: 382 [48.5%]) revealed that occurrence of dietary high-risk behavior was more in urban students (11.4%) than rural students (1.8%). Regarding violence, occurrence of high-risk behavior was also higher among urban students (18.8% vs. 6%). The number of mentally disturbed girls is more than boys. Conclusion: The mean risk scores in all domains, except personal hygiene, are either in ′Moderate′ or ′high′ risk grade. It is of great concern that rural and urban, male and female adolescents are at risk though their vulnerability varies