A descriptive analysis of the drinking behaviour of the 1958 cohort at age 33 and the 1970 cohort at age 34

This paper provides a comparison of the drinking patterns of members of the 1958 British Birth Cohort at age 33 in 1991 and members of the 1970 British Birth Cohort at age 34 in 2004. In particular the focus is on the relationships between social class, gender and drinking behaviour and how these may have changed over time. In addition we exploit the detailed information available in the cohort studies about the kinds of alcohol that individuals drink to provide a description of how this varies between the two cohorts born twelve years apart. The paper also provides detailed descriptive analyses of the links between frequency of drinking and the number of units drunk for both cohorts. Results suggest that although the 1970 cohort report drinking more frequently than the 1958 cohort did at a similar age, there is only a modest increase in the average number of units of alcohol consumed per week for women and no increase for men. The paper also highlights some possible problems with data on alcohol consumption collected in the 2000 sweep of NCDS and BCS70 and concludes by making some comparisons between data collected in the cohort studies and data collected in the General Household Survey

Economic position and occupational segregation in the 1990s: A comparison of the ONS Longitudinal Study and the 1958 National Child Development Study

This paper has two aims. The first is to examine the comparability of the 1958 British Birth Cohort Study, known as the National Child Development Study (NCDS) and the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Longitudinal Study (LS), in terms of the information they provide about the employment profile of their respective samples.The second aim is to describe changes in occupational segregation in England and Wales in the decade between 1991 and 2000/2001. By using the longitudinal data contained in both the NCDS and the LS it is possible to examine not only the aggregate changes in occupational segregation, but also individual transitions between different types of occupations characterised according to the percentage of women working within the occupation

Physical capability and the advantages and disadvantages of ageing : Perceptions of older age by men and women in two British cohorts

In an increasingly ageing society, its older members are receiving considerable political and policy attention. However, much remains to be learnt about public perceptions of older age, particularly the views and experiences of older individuals themselves. Drawing on qualitative interviews carried out with members of two British cohorts (N = ??) who have reached the ‘third age’, this paper discusses perceptions of age, focusing particularly on how perceived advantages and disadvantages differ by respondents’ self-reported physical capability. The interviews were carried out in ???? as part of the HALCyon (Healthy Ageing across the Life Course) collaborative research programme. Findings suggest there is some difference in the way older people view aspects of ageing by capability and that although advantages are widely perceived, physical decline and associated health concerns were the overwhelming theme across the conversations. The article concludes by making tentative suggestions to inform the positive ageing agenda and its related policies

The narrative potential of the British Birth Cohort Studies

This paper draws attention to the narrative potential of longitudinal studies such as the British Birth Cohort Studies (BBCS), and explores the possibility of creating narrative case histories and conducting narrative analysis based on information available from the studies. The BBCS have historically adopted a quantitative research design and used structured interviews and questionnaires to collect data from large samples of individuals born in specific years. However, the longitudinal nature of these studies means that they follow the same sample of individuals from birth through childhood into adult life, and this leads to the creation of data that can be understood as a quantitative auto/biography

Patient and clinician engagement with health information in the primary care waiting room: A mixed methods case study

Background. Primary care waiting rooms can be sites of health promotion and health literacy development through the provision of readily accessible health information. To date, few studies have considered patient engagement with televised health messages in the waiting room, nor have studies investigated whether patients ask their clinicians about this information. The aim of this study was therefore to examine patient (or accompanying person) and clinician engagement with waiting room health information, including televised health messages. Design and methods. The mixed methods case study was undertaken in a regional general practice in Victoria, Australia, utilising patient questionnaires, waiting room observations, and clinician logbooks and interviews. The qualitative data were analysed by content analysis; the questionnaire data were analysed using descriptive statistics. Results. Patients engaged with a range of health information in the waiting room and reportedly received health messages from this information. 44% of the questionnaire respondents (33 of 74) reported watching the television health program, and half of these reported receiving a take home health message from this source. Only one of the clinicians (N=9) recalled a patient asking about the televised health program. Conclusions. The general practice waiting room remains a site where people engage with the available health information, with a televised health ‘infotainment’ program receiving most attention from patients. Our study showed that consumption of health information was primarily passive and tended not to activate patient discussions with clinicians. Future studies could investigate any link between the health infotainment program and behaviour change.N/

Preliminary ethnoarchaeological research on modern animal husbandry in Bestansur, Iraqi Kurdistan: integrating animal, plant and environmental data

This paper presents preliminary results from an ethnoarchaeological study of animal husbandry in the modern village of Bestansur, situated in the lower Zagros Mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan. This research explores how modern families use and manage their livestock within the local landscape and identifies traces of this use. The aim is to provide the groundwork for future archaeological investigations focusing on the nearby Neolithic site of Bestansur. This is based on the premise that modern behaviours can suggest testable patterns for past practices within the same functional and ecological domains. Semi-structured interviews conducted with villagers from several households provided large amounts of information on modern behaviours that helped direct data collection, and which also illustrate notable shifts in practices and use of the local landscape over time. Strontium isotope analysis of modern plant material demonstrates that a measurable variation exists between the alluvial floodplain and the lower foothills, while analysis of modern dung samples shows clear variation between sheep/goat and cow dung, in terms of numbers of faecal spherulites. These results are specific to the local environment of Bestansur and can be used for evaluating and contextualising archaeological evidence as well as providing modern reference material for comparative purposes

Cognitive function in childhood and lifetime cognitive change in relation to mental wellbeing in four cohorts of older people

Background: poorer cognitive ability in youth is a risk factor for later mental health problems but it is largely unknown whether cognitive ability, in youth or in later life, is predictive of mental wellbeing. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether cognitive ability at age 11 years, cognitive ability in later life, or lifetime cognitive change are associated with mental wellbeing in older people.Methods: we used data on 8191 men and women aged 50 to 87 years from four cohorts in the HALCyon collaborative research programme into healthy ageing: the Aberdeen Birth Cohort 1936, the Lothian Birth Cohort 1921, the National Child Development Survey, and the MRC National Survey for Health and Development. We used linear regression to examine associations between cognitive ability at age 11, cognitive ability in later life, and lifetime change in cognitive ability and mean score on the Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale and meta-analysis to obtain an overall estimate of the effect of each.Results: people whose cognitive ability at age 11 was a standard deviation above the mean scored 0.53 points higher on the mental wellbeing scale (95% confidence interval 0.36, 0.71). The equivalent value for cognitive ability in later life was 0.89 points (0.72, 1.07). A standard deviation improvement in cognitive ability in later life relative to childhood ability was associated with 0.66 points (0.39, 0.93) advantage in wellbeing score. These effect sizes equate to around 0.1 of a standard deviation in mental wellbeing score. Adjustment for potential confounding and mediating variables, primarily the personality trait neuroticism, substantially attenuated these associations.Conclusion: associations between cognitive ability in childhood or lifetime cognitive change and mental wellbeing in older people are slight and may be confounded by personality trait difference