Health Education Population Survey, 2007

NHS Health Scotland is the national agency for health education in Scotland, providing leadership for health promotion in Scotland. Its remit includes:<ul><li>educational action to strengthen individuals' knowledge, skills and capabilities</li><li>building the capacities of systems which shape the social, environmental and economic conditions which create and sustain health</li></ul>NHS Health Scotland is also committed to measuring the effectiveness of its activities and commissions research to provide reliable evaluation evidence and to inform the development of programmes. As part of this research programme, BMRB Social Research were commissioned to conduct the first <i>Health Education Population Survey</i> (HEPS) every March and September from March 1996 until March 1999 (seven waves in total). The resulting data, covering all three years, are held at the UK Data Archive as a single study under SN 4949. The second and following HEPS surveys were then conducted every March and September until September 2005 (ten waves in total), with two waves comprising each yearly dataset (see SNs 4950-4952, 5202 and 5470). Fieldwork was then commissioned for a further four waves, with waves eleven and twelve (conducted January-April and August-December 2006) comprising the 2006 dataset, held under SN 5713. These were followed by waves thirteen and fourteen (conducted January-April and August-November 2007) and are held under SN 6023.<br>
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The main objectives of HEPS are as follows:<ul><li>to monitor trends in health-related attitudes, knowledge, beliefs and behaviours, and to assess the impacts of specific activities</li><li>contribute to planning and development of health promotion initiatives through the inclusion of more detailed modules on topical issues</li></ul>In the longer term, HEPS aims to develop a strategic view of how and where health promotion activity may be most effective. This can be achieved in the following ways:<ul><li>identifying levels of knowledge regarding the main causes of ill-health</li><li>identifying salient attitudes with respect to health and means of improving health</li><li>identifying levels of motivation with respect to behaviour change to improve health</li><li>developing an understanding of how such indicators may be expected to vary between different population groups</li><li>developing an understanding of individual patterns of health-related attitudes and behaviour and their relationship to the broader socio-cultural environment</li><li>developing an understanding of specific areas of interest</li></ul><br>
Further information and links to publications based on HEPS may be found by search on the <a href="http://www.healthscotland.com/index.aspx" title="healthscotland.com">healthscotland.com</a> web site.<br>
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