Time to change! Using the transition from school to university to promote healthy lifestyle habits in young people

众所周知，健康饮食、锻炼、合理饮酒和不吸烟可以降低患癌症、心脏和循环系统疾病、肥胖和2型糖尿病等严重疾病和病症的风险。然而，很少有年轻人从事这些健康行为，以减少他们发展这种健康问题的风险。不幸的是，在成年早期养成的习惯往往会持续下去，并对成年中期和后期的健康产生不利影响。此外，青年人表现出的一些危险行为，如酗酒，可能立即产生负面的健康和社会问题，包括事故、伤害、身体暴力和性冒险。因此，针对这一年龄组的干预措施可能特别有益于产生短期和长期的健康效益。研究人员、从业人员和政策制定者都在寻找鼓励年轻人养成更健康生活习惯的方法。目前的研究提出了一种新的干预措施，结合了健康心理学的三种行为改变技术，在从学校到大学的过渡期间使用最新的数字技术来改变年轻人的健康行为。这种干预在三个方面是新颖的。(1)干预结合了健康心理学的三种技术，以（i）确保健康信息不会在未经考虑的情况下被驳回（通过自我肯定任务），（ii）制定针对最重要的预测因素的健康信息（例如，（iii）确保人们的良好意愿转化为行为（通过使用规划任务）。(2)干预措施将在从学校到大学的过渡期间提供（即，从大学开学前一个月到开学后一个月）。每年都有很多年轻人这样做。这种生活转变是干预的关键（或“可教”）时刻，因为人们的信仰和行为由于社会环境的重大变化而处于变化状态（因此更容易受到影响）。(3)最新的数字技术（例如，互联网，智能手机），这是学生的社会世界的一部分，将被用来提供干预。这将确保干预措施是互动的，并吸引学生。一所大型城市大学的所有新生（约4，000名）将被邀请参加研究。一半将分配给干预组，另一半分配给对照组。所有参与者将在开始大学前一个月以及大学后一个月和六个月完成在线问卷，评估他们的健康信念和行为。我们会进行分析，看看干预组的人是否采取更多健康行为（例如，多吃水果和蔬菜，多运动，少喝酒，少抽烟）。如果该项目取得成功，将增进我们对如何促进年轻人健康生活习惯的了解。因此，它将在最佳做法方面创造一个持久的遗产，以帮助学生在开始上大学时养成健康的生活习惯，并在未来向所有新生提供干预措施的技术手段。

Eating healthily, exercising, drinking sensibly and not smoking are known to reduce the risk of developing serious diseases and conditions such as cancer, heart and circulatory disease, obesity and type 2 diabetes. However, few young people engage in these health behaviours to a level that reduces their risk of developing such health problems. Unfortunately, the habits acquired in early adulthood can often persist and have a detrimental effect on health in middle and later adulthood. Moreover, some of the risky behaviours displayed by young people, such as binge drinking, can have immediate negative health and social problems, including accidents, injuries, physical violence and sexual risk taking. Consequently, interventions targeted at this age group may be particularly beneficial in producing both short-term and long-term benefits to health. Researchers, practitioners, and policy makers alike seek ways of encouraging young people to adopt healthier lifestyle habits. The current research proposes a new intervention, combining three behaviour change techniques from health psychology, that is delivered during the transition from school to university using the latest digital technologies to produce changes in the health behaviours of young people. The intervention is novel in three ways. (1) The intervention combines three techniques from health psychology to (i) ensure that the health messages are not dismissed without being considered (through a self-affirmation task), (ii) develop health messages that target the most important predictors (e.g., beliefs) of each behaviour (based on a widely-used model of health behaviour, the theory of planned behaviour), and (iii) ensure that people's good intentions are translated into behaviour (through the use of planning tasks). (2) The intervention will be delivered during the transition from school to university (i.e., from one month before to one month after starting university). Many young people make this move each year. Such life transitions are critical (or "teachable") moments to intervene as people's beliefs and behaviour are in a state of flux (and are therefore easier to influence) due to the major changes to their social environments. (3) The latest digital technologies (e.g., internet, smartphones), that are part of students' social worlds, will be used to deliver the intervention. This will ensure that the intervention is interactive and engaging to students. All new students (approximately 4,000) to a large city university will be invited to take part in the research. Half will be allocated to the intervention group and half to a control group. All participants will complete online questionnaires assessing their health beliefs and behaviour one month before starting university as well as one and six months after being at university. We will conduct analyses to see whether those in the intervention group adopt more health behaviours (e.g., eat more fruit and vegetables, exercise more, drink less, smoke less) as a result of the intervention. If successful the project will enhance our knowledge of how to promote healthy lifestyle habits in young people. It will therefore create a lasting legacy in terms of best practices to help students develop healthy lifestyle habits when they start university and the technological means to deliver the intervention to all new students in the future.