Wills W J, Appleton J V, Magnusson J, Brooks F
University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Hertfordshire, UK.
Health Soc Care Community. 2008 May;16(3):244-52. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2524.2008.00764.x. Epub 2008 Mar 18.
Public health and health promotion agendas are usually determined by adults, even when the 'target' population is children and young people. Adult-centred frameworks for health maintenance and the promotion of well-being risk ignoring young people's conceptualizations and experiences of health and health-relevant behaviours. However, the current policy emphasis in the UK and elsewhere apparently seeks to position young people at the centre of their own health-related decisions. Building on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, this paper examines and critiques policies relating to young people in UK, European and worldwide contexts. This paper then introduces data from two qualitative studies conducted in the UK. These studies illustrate that young people's definitions of health often run counter to prevailing public health and health promotion discourses. Young people do, however, often exhibit strategies for managing their health, even though they are frequently restricted by the perceptions that adults have about their lives and behaviour. This paper argues that the new policy discourse is not yet being systematically turned into action to give all young people a voice. This is important to begin to understand young people's perspectives about what matters to them and what really influences their health behaviours.
公共卫生与健康促进议程通常由成年人决定，即便“目标”人群是儿童和年轻人。以成年人为主导的健康维持及幸福促进框架，有忽视年轻人对健康及与健康相关行为的概念化理解和经历的风险。然而，目前英国及其他地方的政策重点显然试图将年轻人置于与其自身健康相关决策的核心位置。基于《联合国儿童权利公约》，本文审视并批判了英国、欧洲及全球背景下与年轻人相关的政策。接着，本文引入了在英国开展的两项定性研究的数据。这些研究表明，年轻人对健康的定义常常与主流的公共卫生和健康促进话语相悖。不过，年轻人确实常常展现出管理自身健康的策略，尽管他们常常受到成年人对其生活和行为看法的限制。本文认为，新的政策话语尚未被系统地转化为行动，以使所有年轻人都能发出自己的声音。这对于开始理解年轻人关于对他们重要之事以及真正影响其健康行为的观点很重要。
