In 2005, the World Health Organization recognized gender as a structural driver of inequalities in health. While health patterns unfold throughout the life course, it is during the transitional period of early adolescence, 10e14 years of age, that a gender divide in health begins to emerge with consequences that exacerbate across adolescence and through adulthood. While the original understanding of this divide was mostly rooted in a biomedical conceptualization of gender (often conflated with sex), we have moved toward a biosocial understanding of gender as a sociocultural process that interacts with and regulates the bodies through differential patterns of exposures and practices. However, there are limited data outside of the United States and other Western societies that contribute to our understanding of the ways in which gender shapes health and well-being among early adolescents across diverse cultural settings. Understanding the extent to which this social process is fluid and consequential for health during this transitional period can also provide us with necessary insights into improving the design of effective early interventions to promote health and reduce inequities over the life course.