Menzies' researchers have shown how a person's education level and that of their parents predicts a healthy lifestyle. The study examined key health behaviours including smoking, diet, physical activity, alcohol consumption and weight. The findings were recently published in the international journal BMC Public Health.

Previous research has shown that parents' education levels can influence children's health far into the future.

Lead author of the study, Dr Seana Gall says that "the important thing we found was that the effect of parents' education could be overcome by a person's own educational achievements."

"People achieving a higher level of education than their parents were more likely to adopt a healthy lifestyle suggesting that population-wide improvements in education may be important for health," Dr Gall said.

"This research was novel because it provides some of the only data from Australia on these types of inequalities and it focused on younger people, while most other studies have included older people," Dr Gall said.

"Social and economic circumstances change greatly over time and between countries, so we need to keep examining whether these types of inequalities exist."

The investigation, which is part of the Childhood Determinants of Adult Health (CDAH) study, included over 2000 young Australians aged 26 to 36 years from around Australia. The study included authors from the Faculty of Education at the University of Tasmania and the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute.

Although the study included people from all around Australia, the results might be particularly important for Tasmania.

"The recent National Health Survey showed Tasmanians have more unhealthy behaviours than people in other States, particularly in terms of smoking and being overweight" Dr Gall said.

"We also know that Tasmania has one of the lowest school retention rates in Australia. Our results suggest that if we improve school retention we might also see improvements in the health of Tasmanians in years to come" Dr Gall said.

Funding bodies that support this study include: the National Health and Medical Research Council, the National Heart Foundation of Australia, Tasmanian Community Fund and Veolia Environmental Services.