Adolescents' Reasons for Smoking

Part of the Hutchinson Smoking Prevention Project, this study provides information on reasons reported by adolescents for their smoking behavior. A total of 1,615 10th grade students in 20 rural and suburban school districts in Washington state were asked why they currently smoke and why they first...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of school health 1992-05, Vol.62 (5), p.185-190
Main Authors: Sarason, Irwin G., Mankowski, Eric S., Peterson Jr, Arthur V., Dinh, Khanh T.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adolescent
Adolescent Behavior
Adolescents
Behavior Descriptions
Child Health
Children & youth
Decision Making
Female
Grade 10
Health aspects
Health Behavior
High School Students
High Schools
Humans
Male
Motivation
Nursing
Psychological aspects
Sex Factors
Smoking
Smoking - epidemiology
Smoking - psychology
Smoking and youth
Social research
Student Behavior
Student Motivation
Teenagers
Washington
Washington - epidemiology
Youth
Youth smoking
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Summary:Part of the Hutchinson Smoking Prevention Project, this study provides information on reasons reported by adolescents for their smoking behavior. A total of 1,615 10th grade students in 20 rural and suburban school districts in Washington state were asked why they currently smoke and why they first smoked. For beginning smoking, curiosity, social norms, and social pressure were the most frequently given reasons for smoking. For current smoking, pleasure and addiction were mentioned most often. A number of gender differences occurred with 10th grade students beginning and current smoking. More females than males reported social norms and social pressure as reasons for beginning to smoke, whereas for currently smoking, pleasure was given as a reason more frequently by females than males. When developing interventions, smoking prevention programs need to consider students' current and past smoking behavior, and the reasons they give for smoking. (J Sch Health. 1992;62(5):185–190)
ISSN:0022-4391
1746-1561
DOI:10.1111/j.1746-1561.1992.tb06039.x