The Effect of Non-Cognitive Traits on Health Behaviours in Adolescence

Silvia Mendolia and Ian Walker ()

No 7301, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: This paper investigates the relationship between personality traits in adolescence and health behaviours using a large and recent cohort study. In particular, we investigate the impact of locus of control, self-esteem and conscientiousness at age 15-16, on the incidence of health behaviours such as: alcohol consumption; cannabis and other drug use; unprotected and early sexual activity; and sports and physical activity. We use matching methods to control for a very rich set of adolescent and family characteristics and we find that personality traits do affect health behaviours. In particular, individuals with external locus of control, or with low self-esteem, or with low levels of conscientiousness are more likely to engage in health-risky behaviours.

Keywords: self-esteem; locus of control; personality; health behaviours (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I18 I28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 30 pages
Date: 2013-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-hea and nep-neu
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published - published in: Health Economics, 2014, 23 (9), 1146-1158

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp7301.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: THE EFFECT OF NONCOGNITIVE TRAITS ON HEALTH BEHAVIOURS IN ADOLESCENCE (2014)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iza:izadps:dp7301

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().