Šiuolaikinėje visuomenėje sveikatos raštingumas pripažįstamas kaip vienas iš pagrindinių veiksnių, lemiančių sveiką gyvenseną ir sveikatą. Sveikatos raštingumas – tai asmeniniai gebėjimai rasti, suprasti, vertinti ir taikyti, siekiant kasdieniame gyvenime daryti išvadas ir priimti sprendimus, susijusius su sveikatos priežiūra, ligų prevencija ir sveikatos stiprinimu gyvenimo kokybei palaikyti arba gerinti visuose gyvenimo etapuose. Mokslinių tyrimų rezultatai rodo, kad sveikatos raštingumas gali būti svarbus veiksnys motyvuojant žmones tapti fiziškai aktyviais. Sveikatos raštingumo tyrimai pastaruosius kelis dešimtmečius sulaukia vis didesnio užsienio šalių mokslininkų dėmesio, tačiau Lietuvoje tai dar retai tyrinėjama sritis. Mažai žinoma, kaip Lietuvos jaunimo sveikatos raštingumas susijęs fiziniu aktyvumu. Šio straipsnio tikslas – atskleisti jaunimo sveikatos raštingumo ir fizinio aktyvumo sąsajas. Atliekant tyrimą naudota anoniminė anketinė apklausa internetu. Klausimyną sudarė trys dalys: 1) demografiniai duomenys (lytis, amžius), 2) klausimas fiziniam aktyvumui nustatyti (Kaip dažnai per pastarąjį mėnesį mankštinotės 30 minučių ar ilgiau, pvz., bėgiojote, vaikščiojote, važinėjote dviračiu?), 3) sveikatos raštingumo klausimynas HLS-EU-Q-47. Tyrime savanoriškai dalyvavo 18–29 m. jaunuoliai, iš jų 399 vaikinai ir 399 merginos. Tyrimo duomenims analizuoti naudotas statistinis paketas IBM SPSS.26. Taikyti aprašomosios statistikos metodai (absoliutūs ir procentiniai dažniai, vidurkis, standartinis nuokrypis, minimali ir maksimali reikšmė, ekscesas ir asimetrijos koeficientas), taikytas Stjudento (angl. Student) t testas, Chi kvadrato testas, efekto dydžiui įvertinti – Kramerio V. Apibendrinus tyrimo duomenis, nustatyta, kad tik 38,8 proc. vaikinų ir 24,8 proc. merginų laikosi PSO rekomendacijų dėl fizinio aktyvumo, tik 41,8 proc. vaikinų ir 43,3 proc. merginų bendras sveikatos raštingumas pakankamas arba puikus. Bendro sveikatos raštingumo vidurkis (M = 31,09, SD = 7,34), apskaičiuotas visai tyrimo imčiai, rodo, kad jaunimui būdingas probleminis sveikatos raštingumas. Tiriant sveikatos raštingumo ir fizinio aktyvumo sąsajas, gauti nevienareikšmiški rezultatai. Nustatyta, kad tiek fiziškai aktyvių, tiek nepakankamai fiziškai aktyvių vaikinų sveikatos raštingumo lygis sveikatos priežiūros srityje ir ligų prevencijos srityje buvo panašus. Tačiau rasta, kad puikiu sveikatos raštingumu sveikatos stiprinimo srityje (χ2 = 7,951, p < 0,05) ir puikiu bendruoju sveikatos raštingumu (χ2 = 9,337, p < 0,05) pasižymėjo daugiau fiziškai aktyvių vaikinų nei neaktyvių. Nors tai statistiškai reikšmingos sąsajos, gautas efekto dydis nedidelis (Kramerio V atitinkamai 0,141 ir 0,153). Fiziškai aktyvių ir neaktyvių merginų imtyse sveikatos raštingumas sveikatos stiprinimo srityje buvo panašaus lygio. Fiziškai aktyvių merginų, kurioms būdingas puikus sveikatos raštingumas sveikatos priežiūros srityje (χ2 = 9,636, p < 0,05) ir puikus bendrasis sveikatos raštingumas (χ2 = 19,583, p < 0,0001), buvo statistiškai reikšmingai daugiau, palyginti su fiziškai neaktyviomis merginomis, nors Kramerio V reikšmė rodo nedidelį (V = 0,155) ir vidutinį (V = 0,222) poveikio dydį. Atlikto tyrimo rezultatai yra svarbus įrodymas, kad investicijos į jaunimo sveikatos raštingumą yra ypač svarbios, nes šių įgūdžių reikės ateityje priimant su sveikata susijusius sprendimus. Šis tyrimas padeda plėtoti sveikatos raštingumo tyrimus Lietuvoje, prisideda prie jaunimo sveikatos raštingumo pažinimo ir informuoja, kaip svarbu užtikrinti sveikatos raštingumo ugdymo tęstinumą jaunuoliams baigus vidurinio ugdymo pakopą.

Since 1991 Belarus has been implementing a youth policy. Scientific problem was formulated as follows: How effective is the model of youth policy in Belarus? The present paper aimed at investigating the extent how young people are informed about the directions of youth policy; how do they evaluate its implementation; what kind of support do they need; what should be changed in the youth policy in order to increase its effectiveness. Research methodology: neoinstitutional analysis of the youth policy model on the basis of legislation and government programs. Empirical research is based on an online survey of 387 respondents. It was revealed that young people are least informed about the mechanisms of support in the labor market and about the support of young families. The key moment in the development of the state youth policy in Belarus is that support should be provided to all youth, and not to certain categories of it.

Insufficient analysis of green infrastructure spaces benefit to youth activity promotion in Lithuanian social sciences discourse enabled to formulate scientific problem – what can be possibilities of using green infrastructure spaces while strengthening youth integration and participation in local community? The aim of the article – after analyzing social benefit of green infrastructure spaces to youth, to determine their usage possibilities for strengthening youth integration and participation in local community. Research methods: scientific literature, document analysis and synthesis, abstraction and comparison methods. Šiauliai district Kuršėnai town environmentally directed school’s projects were analysed for the case study. For youth, green infrastructure spaces are the areas for environmental education, health improvement, strengthening of their integration and participation in local community through various activities. Youth gradually become involved into social activity where their status of a passive participant changes into the status of an active participant. Case study can be used by various local actors (other schools, community, teachers, parents etc.) strengthening integration and participation of youth in local community by using GI spaces.

Background: the Olympic movement associates the range of values. Some of them have a real impact; others remain at the level of desirable. Objective of this study was to find out how 12-19 year-old Czech young people (1274 boys and 1090 girls) know the main facts of the Olympic movement and distinguish between values which have real impact and those that remain rather as desire. The second aim was comparison in knowledge of Olympic facts and between values of the identical surveys carried out in the years 1998 and 2008. Methods: the “Olympic questionnaire” has been used for the assessment of the knowledge of Olympic facts and Olympic ideals. The frequency of the respondents´ participation in sport was measured by means of the COMPASS methodology. Results confirmed the hypothesis about the positive impact of participation in sport on the knowledge of the Olympic facts of the respondents. Conformity in the assessment of the most desirable and real Olympic ideals was found in values associated with sport performance: physical fitness, competition, sportsmanship, etc. The real impact of some ethical Olympic values like honour, cultural understanding, broadmindedness, nobility, modesty etc., was assessed as less significant. Conclusions: participation in sports positively affects level of knowledge about the facts of the Olympic Movement. The order in which young people evaluate Olympic values (their desirability and reality) did not change over the period of 1998 – 2008.

This paper will present school related findings from COPING, a three year pan European research Project that investigated the impact of parental imprisonment on children in the UK, Romania, Germany and Sweden. It will focus on good practice points for schools regarding how they can most effectively support children of prisoners by drawing on the views expressed by young people and families affected by imprisonment, as well as professionals who work in a school setting. This paper will therefore stress the need for all school staff to be trained with regard to the impact upon children of parental imprisonment.

With the rising anxiety levels among young adults, mainly caused by their daily use of social media), it is hypothesized that one of the major reasons why young adults are becoming more physically passive is determined by implicit media influence on shaping their perceptions of health and healthy lifestyle. This study aims to clarify how media created reality in the context of health and healthy lifestyle can be affecting Lithuanian young adults and their perceptions of health. To achieve the above, two procedural steps were followed. First, 30 articles from the Lithuanian media sources such as Delfi, Lrytas and 15min. were collected and analysed in the theoretical framework of cognitive linguistics and Critical Metaphor Analysis by procedurally applying Metaphor Identification Procedure. The media texts were analysed by using the bottom-up approach to deconstructing systematic metaphor and its ideological functions. Second, 44 young adults (aged 18–20) participated in the online health survey, where they provided answers to both closed and open questions. The findings have shown that the prevalent media scenario correlates with young adults’ responses, whose underlying narrative is driven by such frames as health is a (luxurious) commodity, people are passive observers and recipients of services provided by health experts etc. Thus, it can be argued that media consumerist approach to health negatively affects young adults’ perceptions and resonates with an idea of health as an obtained commodity, which deprives young adults of conscious attempts to become healthier and make their own conscious decisions about a healthy lifestyle.

Literature to date on the neo-Pagan movement in Russia has focused on understanding the movement as a form of “escape” and evaluating the relative “harm” posed to individuals and society by such organisations. This research focused on the everyday manifestation and reproduction of Slavic neo-Pagan groups in St. Petersburg. The research suggested that, as the Slavic neo-Pagan movement struggled to establish an agreed set of principles and practices, disagreements focused on the relative weight of its ideological and cultural components and that particular communities of neo-Pagans had become organised around their position in relation to these discourses.

Skinhead groups are not ascetic formations withdrawn from the “real”, mainstream world but groups of young people who are profoundly conscious of the world in which they live and are motivated by the need to change it. This desire to interact with and change the world leads to violent street action (in particular attacks on members of ethnic minorities and others who they feel “disgrace” Russia, e.g., homeless people). However, it also means that such groups are responsive to changes in the external environment, and this case study suggested clearly that the increased threat of arrest and imprisonment for both race-related crimes and incitement to racial and ethnic hatred has had a major impact on the performance of skinheads.

Drug use within the youth cultural environment is widespread and unremarkable; this means that drug users can rarely be considered to constitute distinct “subcultures”. In the context of processes of de-industrialisation and marketisation, drugs are a key commodity for sale and exchange. In the tough economic climate of the Russian far north – where geographical location means that hemp and opium based drugs cannot be locally grown, and supply routes are truncated by poor transportation links – they may become a key component of the informal economy. A key finding of this research was that the sale of drugs was one of a range of “hustling” practices – including trade in “acquired” goods and drugs, money-lending and “sorting” disputes – that were widespread among young people, whether or not they used drugs themselves.

A hypothesis was raised that the knowledge of the young Belarusians and Lithuanians would be different on the most important facts and topics of the history of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, such as the foundation of the state, the first ruler and the first capital, the Vilnius issue, as well as the cultural and religious nature of the country. Drawing on the answers of the first and the second year students of Humanities and Social Sciences from J. Kupala University, Grodno (105 respondents) and Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas (184 respondents) the hypothesis was confirmed. The article analyzes the causes of this phenomenon, discussing the most important historiographical works of the 20th century which formed the national narratives of both countries. The Belarusian as well as the Lithuanian national narratives acknowledge the whole history of the Grand Duchy but are ethnographically and territorially limited, and focus only on the modern frontiers and on the modern nations. As a result, it s not surprising that people feel and understand the common past in different ways.