Youth in Europe Study (YES!) is an international research project aimed at gaining more insight into the current living conditions and opinions of young people. The survey is conducted in Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands and England. The study includes more than 20 000 young people in these countries and covers areas such as:

School
Health
Friends
Family
Leisure
Integration
Views and opinions

The study aims to answer questions about young people's living conditions and to compare these between countries, for example:

What role does the school, family and friends play for youth in Europe?
What are the hobbies, interests and issues young people are engaged in?
How do their educational careers and early labour market trajectories evolve?
What can be done in order to improve young people’s chances of success in education and work?

In Sweden, the first survey wave was conducted during spring 2011 in about 250 randomly sampled school classes, when the students attended the eighth grade. A questionnaire was also sent out to guardians of all respondents (in most cases a parent), and the class teacher was asked to fill in a questionnaire about the school.

In spring 2012, a second survey wave was fielded in the same school classes. A year later, in 2013, the third survey wave was carried out. This time, as most of the participants had proceeded to some form of secondary education, respondents were invited to participate in a web questionnaire.

In 2015-2016, the study will enter into its fourth wave, and again the participants are invited to respond via the web. This time many of the questions will concern life after graduation, whether the participants have started with work or further studies, and what plans they have for the future. For the first time, the study is also extended to new participants who were not in the original survey in order to broaden the respondent base.

Youth in Europe (YES!) is a joint initiative of researchers from Stockholm University, the University of Mannheim, University of Utrecht, Tilburg University, and University of Oxford. The research is funded by NORFACE, a conglomerate of a number of national research councils. In Sweden the survey is carried out by Statistics Sweden (SCB) on behalf of the Institute for Social Research (SOFI), Stockholm University.