Nearly 65 Percent of Smokers Ages 16-24 Tried To Quit Smoking During Previous Year

How to quit smoking?

Adolescent and young adult smokers want to stop smoking and many 64 percent have tried during the past year. Results from the National Youth Smoking Cessation Survey, a two-year, longitudinal study of more than 2,500 smokers aged 16-24, were presented today at the 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health Conference in Washington, D.C. The study examined level of dependence, parental influence and motivation to quit.

77% of smokers surveyed reported that they had tried to quit smoking at least once in their lifetime. According to 12-month follow up interviews, the strongest predictors of quitting were levels of addiction, including dependence on nicotine and numbers of cigarettes smoked each day. For instance, 25 percent of smokers considered less dependent according to the Nicotine Dependence Syndrome Scale were abstinent in follow up interviews. Parental influence was another strong predictor. Smokers whose parents smoked were half as likely to quit smoking as those with a parent who either had quit or had never smoked. Young smokers who thought their parents would ask them to quit smoking were three times more likely to quit smoking than smokers who perceived they would get either no reaction from smoking in front of their parents, or that their parents would actually join them for a cigarette.

"This population is such a critical group. They are very susceptible to the marketing of cigarettes through advertising. And once they start experimenting with tobacco they become addicted very quickly," said Gary A. Giovino PhD, lead investigator of the Survey and director of the Tobacco Control Research Program at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, NY.

The Survey, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the National Cancer Institute and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Office on Smoking and Health, contains the only nationally representative data of its kind. The next phase of data from the survey is due out in 2007 and will look at the impact of quitting methods and environmental factors.

"These young smokers want to quit, and many of them are trying. Now let's better understand which quitting techniques will be most effective for them," said Giovino. "We know environmental factors like price increases and smoke-free indoor air laws are working, but we also know there are misperceptions out there that need correcting, such as the mistaken belief among these smokers that nicotine replacement therapy is as dangerous as smoking."