High School Smokers

One of my first memories in the United States was taking a Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E) class. I was in sixth grade and a top student, as talking about drugs and alcohol and the way they affect us was fascinating to me. This is why, the following year, I volunteered to become a peer educator in Teens Against Tobacco Use (T.A.T.U). For a couple of years, I gave presentations to young students which included facts, demonstrations, and games, to spread the knowledge that tobacco is harmful and that staying away from smoking prolongs life expectancy and increases the quality of life. It should come as no surprise, then, that I consider myself a big proponent of staying tobacco-free and encouraging others to quit smoking as a great way to promote health. I remember watching my mom and sister as they took part in their nightly ritual of smoking a few cigarettes to unwind. “Did you know that a main component of cigarettes is used as rocket fuel?” I would ask them, as I opened the window and they stared back at me blankly. “We know, we know” was the answer every time. I knew that convincing them to quit was no easy task, but I was committed. Day after day, I proudly stated a new fact about the evils of smoking. Finally one day, they quit. At first, they attributed it to the cost. Since we had just immigrated to the United States, the cost of cigarettes was simply not something they could afford. I didn’t believe it. I proudly

Many smokers, like Sload, take their first puffs in college. Other students experiment with cigarettes in high school but start smoking heavily in college. Everyone I surveyed and interviewed is aware that smoking was responsible for the deaths of many people every year. They know it increased the risk of heart attack and stroke and adversely affects breathing and the lungs. And like smokers of any age, many college students are actively trying to quit. Mandie Sload knows that for or five cigarettes a day were four or five too many. She plans to quit someday. She understands that if she quits her breath will smell better;

Over the last few decades, tobacco and nicotine prevention efforts have risen to an all time high. Prevention efforts focus on education to the public of the negative effects on one’s health when using tobacco and nicotine products, as well as with pleas to healthcare policymakers to increase restrictions on product manufacturing and sales. One policy effort growing in popularity in the United States is called Tobacco 21, which proposes to raise the legal age of purchase for consumers of tobacco and nicotine products to 21 years of age (Farber, Pakhale, & Neptune, 2016). Farber, Pakhale, and Neptune (2016) state that 90% of tobacco and nicotine users begin smoking before the age of 18, with 99% of users starting before the age of 26. Lower smoking cessation rates are associated with earlier ages of initiation and the tobacco industry is known to target youth in advertisement of these products lending to the early age of initiation. The tobacco industry themselves admit that increasing the age allowed for purchase to exclude youth would substantially effect their sales. Tobacco 21 laws also deter adolescents from gaining tobacco or nicotine products from friends 18 to 21 years of age, which is the most likely age group to supply younger teens. With this knowledge, placing tighter restrictions on consumers younger than 21 years of age, using the Tobacco 21 policy, may deter tobacco and nicotine initiation in hopes to prevent individual use at all in the future (Farber

Of the roughly 42 million adults in the US that use tobacco, nearly 69% of smokers want to quit and more than 42% of those wishing to quit will make the attempt through various methods(1). These methods range from the "cold turkey" method, nicotine replacement therapy, behavioural therapy and even medicine. Each method has it's unique strengths and weaknesses as well as varying success rates. There are many reasons to quit and many ways in which to do so, either with methods that involve slowly weaning off of nicotine, like gums and patches from replacement therapy, to nicotine-free methods which require support from various sources.

In March 1985, a school official at a High School in Middlesex County, N. J., found underage T. L. O and friend smoking in a restroom in the freshman/sophomore building of the school. Smoking is prohibited in this particular area. On the grounds that this action violated a school rule, the teacher brought the girls to the principal's office. Here they were introduced to Assistant Principal, Theodore Choplick. When questioned by Choplick T. L. O.’s co-inhabitant admitted to smoking and to breaking the school rule. T. L. O. however would not admit that she was smoking and denied she even smoked at all. Mr. Choplick, asked T. L. O. to follow him into his office where he required T. L. O to hand him her purse. When he opened the purse, he immediately noticed a pack of cigarettes. When he grabbed the cigarettes, Mr. Choplick saw some rolling papers as well. Knowing from experience that rolling papers in a high school setting, may mean drug use, and in turn additional violations of school rules, Mr. Choplick decided to continue his search. Upon further investigation, Mr Choplick’s extensive

In the study, 787 smokers in Massachusetts were tracked after they quit smoking for five years. During that time, they answered three surveys about their smoking use. With each survey, an

Most often seniors in high schools can purchase cigarettes because they are 18, so they distribute them to underclassmen or friends. Nearly 21 percent of high schoolers in public schools smoke cigarettes, which would be about 3.13 million students (Preidt). My survey shows that only four percent, or two out of 49 people admit their addiction to cigarettes. The two students admitted that stress is their reasoning for why they began smoking and continue, but only one has support to end their need to smoke. While the student with assistance is continuing to smoke, they are attempting to stop; however, the effects of smoking are obviously severe (lung disease, cancer, bronchitis, etc.) and cannot continue. Cigarettes may be a partial stress reliever although the permanent and long-term effects should be proof enough that this addiction is a necessity to prevent in our high schoolers even if it is four

Cigarette smoking is the principal form of tobacco use worldwide and has many adverse effects on the health of smokers. In 2000, there were about 5 million tobacco related deaths globally and smoking currently causes almost 1 in 5 deaths in the United States. Aside from causing around 90% of all lung cancer deaths, cigarette smoking harms almost every organ in the body and adversely affects the health of those around the smoker through second-hand smoke. While the rate at which people quit smoking is limited due to the development of nicotine addiction, rates of smoking initiation can be rapidly be changed through intervention. Such interventions include smoke-free policies like that advertised by the “Tobacco-Free Campus” sign pictured

In 1964, thousands of smokers quit in response to the publication of the Report on Smoking and Health and multiple public education campaigns followed. Early behavior changes in 1970s and 1980s were focused on public education and oriented in health education interventions. These campaigns were modeled with health beliefs and theories. There was an emphasis on raising awareness of the harms of unhealthy behaviors versus the benefits of behavior changes. Doctor-patient relationship was a powerful part of health education at this time. In the mid 1980s, the stages of change model shifted from individual to population intervention. These models had a lasting effect.

O’Byrne, Haddock, Poston, and Mid America Heart Institute (2002) investigated whether parenting style was a risk factor of smoking initiation and experimentation among adolescents and whether there was a relationship between parenting style and readiness to quit, and nicotine dependence among smokers. O’Byrne et al. (2002) defined current smokers as those who smoke regularly, experimenters as individuals who have smoked on one or two occasions, but have not smoked in the past month. Initiated smokers were considered both current smokers and individuals who smoked regularly in the past and then quit. Readiness to quit was categorized into four stages: precontemplation, for those who had no intent on quitting, contemplation, for those who may quit but not within the next 6 months, preparation, for those who will quit within the next 6 months and action, for those who will quit next month. Parenting style was measure by the Family of Origin Scale (FOS) which measured family intimacy and autonomy. This scale

Nowadays students are not only being pressured to smoke by their peers and by their surrounding, but they are also watching their parents smoke. Many teens have been influenced by

One of the largest issues today is adolescent smoking. According to a heath based website, nearly 90% of adult smokers start while they are still teens and they never intend to get hooked. They may start by bumming a cigarette or two from a friend at a party, and then go on to buying an occasional pack. Soon they realize that they can't go without that pack. They've gotten used to reaching for a cigarette first thing in the morning, after meals, or during any stressful time. They become addicted, both physically and psychologically. According to the American Lung Association, each day 6,000 children under the age of 18 smoke their first cigarette. Almost 2,000 of them will become regular smokers – that’s 757, 000 new smokers annually!

Tobacco; one of the most profitable products in history, an addictive substance, and a deadly killer. Smoking tobacco used to be a thing that was endorsed in American society. Now, with the new medical advances and knowledge, society has seen the side effects of smoking and how fatal it actually is. Teenagers have been one of the largest age groups that have been affected by smoking. After analyzing all possible reasons as to why teenagers would smoke while knowing it can affect their health, three possible reasons stuck out the most. Teenagers smoke despite knowing the health problems that originate from smoking because of peer pressure, an “invincibility” mentality, and seeing a role model or family member smoke.

According the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2015), cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the United States, accounting for more than 480,000 deaths every year, or 1 of every five deaths. In 2015, about 15 of every 100 U.S. adults age 18 years or older currently smoke cigarettes. However, this is a decline from nearly 21 of every 100 adults back in 2005. One reason for the decline is due to smoking cessation programs developed within our communities. These programs are helping smokers to quit their habit, and improve their health and lifestyle. Let us look at what it takes to make a smoke cessation successful within ones’ community.

As a high school student I felt as though the positive outcomes would overpower the negatives, which I soon realized would not be the case. The peer pressure I felt from my friends who smoked also added to the reasoning behind my choice to try smoking during the initial stage of my high school experience. “Research suggests that children who smoke cause their non-smoking peers to take up the habit through strategies such as coercion, teasing, bullying and rejection from a desired group (Michell and West, 1996).” Being a student in my first year of high school I felt as though I didn’t know anyone’s true intentions. I felt pressure from older students who were talking to me and trying to influence me into smoking with them. Once I was a bit older I did a self-evaluation to understand that this decision that I was making was not because I truly wanted to, or felt the need to do, but rather the influence of my classmates and peers from the older grades. I felt as though my peers from the older grades needed to see me do this in order to be accepted into their social group. After coming to the conclusion that I would stop smoking and follow my own moral directions, one could argue I was then following categorical imperatives. Categorical imperatives is most simply understood as “a way of evaluating motives for actions (Henry, 2011).” I felt as though I had to follow my own personal moral compass as opposed to the morals set by my peers. Philosopher Immanuel Kant