Behavioral factors which can influence preservation of young people's health

Young people play a most important role in society's life as they possess significant intellectual, creative, labor and reproductive potential. However, this potential might not find its implementation in reality due to both inevitable reduction in number of people belonging to this population category and deteriorating quality of it. And a key issue here is preservation of young people's health. Contemporary young people have poorer health than the previous generations and we can observe a so called "social ill health funnel". There is another acute issue related to demographic losses caused by mortality among young people; they die due to outer causes, circulatory system diseases, malignant neoplasms, and digestive organs diseases, and this mortality is to a great extent determined by behavioral factors. The paper dwells on the analysis of basic self-preservation behavioral parameters determined via a sociological questioning performed among people living in Vologda region. We revealed that those respondents who were younger than 30 tended to evaluate their health as being "good" and "very good" more frequently than older ones; chronic diseases were significantly less frequent among people from younger age groups. We detected that 74 % young people pursued certain health-preservation practices while the remaining 26 % did nothing to preserve their health. Young people explain their striving for health preservation mostly by a desire to have healthy children, to look well, and to achieve their life goals. They don't often visit a doctor with prophylaxis in mind; they tend to do sports. But still, there are young people who indulge in self-destructing behavior. Young people drink low alcohol beverages more often than people from older age groups. 36 % of them smoke but 51 % of smokers wish to give this bad habit up. Fast food is also more popular with young people: 39 % eat it several times a week. And sometimes it is a desire to overcome a stress that makes young people smoke, drink alcohol or eat unhealthy food.