This study will explore the role of primary schools in shaping adolescents’ mental health and health-related behaviours (e.g. smoking). It will investigate both pupils’ individual experiences of school (e.g. relationships with teachers) and broader school factors (e.g ‘ethos’). There are significant gaps in our current understanding, especially the role of children’s own perspectives of their school environment. Research on how the broader primary school context shapes children’s well-being is very limited, and there is none on its impact on adolescent health or behaviours. Nor do we know if (or how) primary school experiences might impact on differences in the health or behaviours of adolescents from more, compared with less, disadvantaged backgrounds.

This study will first investigate how a broad range of factors relating to the academic and social environment at primary school, including children’s own perspectives, help predict adolescent mental health and health-related behaviours. We will also examine whether these factors help explain differences in the health or behaviours of adolescents from more or less disadvantaged backgrounds, and whether the impact of primary school experiences varies according to level of disadvantage. Second, we will explore effects of broader primary school contextual factors (e.g. proportion of pupils eligible for free school meals, school resources and ‘ethos’) on adolescent mental health and health-related behaviours. Lastly, we will investigate whether any effects of these broader school contextual factors differ between adolescents from more, compared with less, disadvantaged backgrounds.