Early Years

Growing up in Scotland (GUS)

Growing up in Scotland study (GUS) logo

GUS is the longitudinal research study following the lives of 8000 Scottish children and their families from birth through to adolescence.

Findings from the third year of the GUS study have been published on the following themes:

  • Non-resident parents
  • Food and activity
  • Parenting and the neighbourhood context
  • Multiple childcare provision and its effect on child outcomes
  • The impact of children's early activities on cognitive development.

Read about the background to this longitudinal research study and find a summary of key findings from Year 3 of Growing up in Scotland (GUS).

What is the Growing up in Scotland study?

This research study is following the lives of 8000 Scottish children and their families from birth through to adolescence. Families are visited once a year to take part in an interview which collects a wide range of information about their child and family life.

Topics covered include family circumstances, child health and development, diet and physical activity, experiences of school and pre-school, use of childcare, and access to support from family and friends. The children themselves also take part - by having their height and weight measured and by completing tests to measure their cognitive ability. All the data collected is kept strictly confidential and cannot be traced back to individuals.

This important information is used by the Government to find out about the needs of young children and their families and to develop policies and plan services to meet these needs. GUS is designed to focus on the early years. In time, researchers will be able to look at impact of early circumstances and experiences on outcomes in later life, for example, in terms of education or health.

There are two groups of children taking part in GUS. Around 5000 children were born between June 2004 and May 2005 and a further 3000 were born between June 2002 and May 2003. The families were selected at random from Child Benefit records and are representative of Scotland as a whole.

GUS is funded by the Scottish Government and is being carried out by the Scottish Centre for Social Research, in collaboration with the Centre for Research on Families and Relationships at the University of Edinburgh and the MRC Social and Public Health Sciences Unit at Glasgow University.