Washington State DOH, OSPI, HCA & LCB

HYS is a collaborative effort of the Department of Health(DOH), the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI), Health Care Authority's Division of Behavioral Health and Recovery, and Liquor and Cannabis Board (LCB).

http://www.k12.wa.us/ - OSPI's website
https://hcahealthcare.com/ - HCA
https://lcb.wa.gov/ -LCB
www.askhys.net - HYS website managed by the contractor

Organization Contact

Anar Shah

Healthy Youth Survey (HYS)

The Healthy Youth Survey (HYS) is administered in the fall of even years to students in grades 6, 8, 10 and 12 in WA. The survey contains questions about a wide variety of adolescent health and behavior topics, from substance use to bullying to water safety to suicidal ideation. Schools choose whether to register for the survey. Each year a state sample is taken, as are county samples for the larger counties. The state sample is used when comparing state-level estimates from year to year.

The Washington State Healthy Youth Survey (HYS) is an effort to measure health risk behaviors that contribute to morbidity, mortality, and social problems among youth in Washington State. These behaviors include alcohol, marijuana, tobacco and other drug use; behaviors that result in intentional and unintentional injuries (e.g., violence); dietary behaviors and physical activity; mental health; school climate; and related risk and protective factors. The 2016 administration was the fifteenth such statewide survey of Washington students and participation has been steadily increasing over time. In 2016, over 230,000 students from all 39 counties participated in HYS.

The HYS questions come from standardized instruments that have been used over multiple years and tested for validity. New HYS questions are field tested with youth to make sure they understand the questions correctly. Research shows that surveys like the HYS can give valid results if youth are given a safe and confidential environment to take the survey.
The survey provides important survey results about the health of adolescents in Washington. County prevention coordinators, community mobilization coalitions, community public health and safety networks, and others use this information to guide policy and programs that serve youth.

Steps Required to Obtain Data

Interactive access to frequency reports and crosstabs at the state, county and ESD level is also available to the general public if requirements for participant anonymity are met on the www.AskHYS.net website.

Please contact Lareina La Flair (PI for the project) at DOH to request access to the dataset.

A statewide data set from which all geographic identifiers have been removed is available to legitimate researchers with a data sharing agreement.

Researchers who wish access to the individual level data with geographic identifiers must submit an Exempt Determination Request to the Washington State Institutional Review Board (WSIRB).