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AUSTIN, TEX. – Adolescents who smoke infrequently or occasionally are prime candidates for smoking cessation counseling, Kathleen A. Kealey said in a poster presentation at the annual meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco.
She and her colleagues at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, administered a classroom-based survey to 93% of all juniors (mean age 17 years) enrolled in 50 high schools in Washington state, and followed each survey with a phone interview to classify them as nonsmokers, infrequent smokers (defined as having smoked at least one cigarette on 1–4 days of the last 30 days), occasional smokers (5–19 smoking days), or regular smokers (20 or more smoking days).
Smoking and nonsmoking students in 25 schools were then randomized to telephone motivational interviewing (at least one call); students in the other 25 schools were assigned to the control arm. Nonsmokers were given reinforcement counseling, in part to avoid stigmatizing the smoking students during enrollment by singling them out among their peers.
The investigators found that fewer infrequent (21%) and occasional (33%) smokers had tried to quit smoking in the last 12 months than had the regular smokers (49%).
However, students in the two lighter-smoking groups were more likely to say that they planned to quit smoking in the next month (30% and 21% vs. 11%) and that they had a strong desire to quit (37% and 32% vs. 26%). All differences were statistically significant.
Regular smokers were less likely to complete the full intervention (62%) than were the infrequent smokers (81%) or occasional smokers (64%), so it appears that adolescent light smokers not only have traits favorable to smoking cessation, they are also amenable to cessation intervention and predisposed to completing such interventions once they begin them.
The study is part of a larger randomized controlled trial that will compare cessation rates among the entire cohort of 2,151 high school seniors.
AUSTIN, TEX. – Adolescents who smoke infrequently or occasionally are prime candidates for smoking cessation counseling, Kathleen A. Kealey said in a poster presentation at the annual meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco.
She and her colleagues at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, administered a classroom-based survey to 93% of all juniors (mean age 17 years) enrolled in 50 high schools in Washington state, and followed each survey with a phone interview to classify them as nonsmokers, infrequent smokers (defined as having smoked at least one cigarette on 1–4 days of the last 30 days), occasional smokers (5–19 smoking days), or regular smokers (20 or more smoking days).
Smoking and nonsmoking students in 25 schools were then randomized to telephone motivational interviewing (at least one call); students in the other 25 schools were assigned to the control arm. Nonsmokers were given reinforcement counseling, in part to avoid stigmatizing the smoking students during enrollment by singling them out among their peers.
The investigators found that fewer infrequent (21%) and occasional (33%) smokers had tried to quit smoking in the last 12 months than had the regular smokers (49%).
However, students in the two lighter-smoking groups were more likely to say that they planned to quit smoking in the next month (30% and 21% vs. 11%) and that they had a strong desire to quit (37% and 32% vs. 26%). All differences were statistically significant.
Regular smokers were less likely to complete the full intervention (62%) than were the infrequent smokers (81%) or occasional smokers (64%), so it appears that adolescent light smokers not only have traits favorable to smoking cessation, they are also amenable to cessation intervention and predisposed to completing such interventions once they begin them.
The study is part of a larger randomized controlled trial that will compare cessation rates among the entire cohort of 2,151 high school seniors.
AUSTIN, TEX. – Adolescents who smoke infrequently or occasionally are prime candidates for smoking cessation counseling, Kathleen A. Kealey said in a poster presentation at the annual meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco.
She and her colleagues at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, administered a classroom-based survey to 93% of all juniors (mean age 17 years) enrolled in 50 high schools in Washington state, and followed each survey with a phone interview to classify them as nonsmokers, infrequent smokers (defined as having smoked at least one cigarette on 1–4 days of the last 30 days), occasional smokers (5–19 smoking days), or regular smokers (20 or more smoking days).
Smoking and nonsmoking students in 25 schools were then randomized to telephone motivational interviewing (at least one call); students in the other 25 schools were assigned to the control arm. Nonsmokers were given reinforcement counseling, in part to avoid stigmatizing the smoking students during enrollment by singling them out among their peers.
The investigators found that fewer infrequent (21%) and occasional (33%) smokers had tried to quit smoking in the last 12 months than had the regular smokers (49%).
However, students in the two lighter-smoking groups were more likely to say that they planned to quit smoking in the next month (30% and 21% vs. 11%) and that they had a strong desire to quit (37% and 32% vs. 26%). All differences were statistically significant.
Regular smokers were less likely to complete the full intervention (62%) than were the infrequent smokers (81%) or occasional smokers (64%), so it appears that adolescent light smokers not only have traits favorable to smoking cessation, they are also amenable to cessation intervention and predisposed to completing such interventions once they begin them.
The study is part of a larger randomized controlled trial that will compare cessation rates among the entire cohort of 2,151 high school seniors.