Objective
To identify the lifestyles of upper grade primary school students in urban and rural areas of Vanuatu
Methods
  All 415 students (urban, 194; and rural, 221) from 6th, 7th, and 8th grade students of primary school from one in the urban area and three in the rural area of Vanuatu participated in this survey. We conducted a self-administered questionnaire survey that included items addressing food consumption, exercise, smoking and drinking experience, health knowledge, attitudes toward health practices, guardians’ parenting attitudes related to health, prevalence of family employment, and number of household possessions. Urban and rural areas were compared on each item by performing chi-square tests for categorical data and Mann-Whitney U tests for ordinal data. Analysis was conducted manually and subsequently checked using SPSS version 18 for Windows. The significance level was set at p < .05.
Results
  A response rate of 100% was obtained from a total target sample students. All responses were valid. Comparisons between urban and rural areas revealed that consumption frequencies of rice, bread, fresh meat, soft drinks, and sweets were higher in urban areas, while root crops, fresh fish, and fruits were consumed more frequently in rural areas. The percentage of students who had ever tried alcohol was significantly higher in urban areas than in rural areas, as were levels of health knowledge related to noncommunicable diseases, favorable health attitudes, the availability of health advice from guardians, the number of family members employed, and the number of household possessions.
Conclusion
  The results indicated that significant differences exist between urban and rural areas for frequency of food consumption, drinking experience, health knowledge, attitudes toward health practices, guardians’ parenting attitudes related to health, the prevalence of family employment, and household possessions.