Decreasing Cigarette Consumption among Teens

If there is one thing I hate in this world mates are cigarettes. I can’t stand those bloody things; they make me cough all the time and smell so terrible. I don’t understand how young people think it’s cool and attractive. Well, here I found an article in the Behavior Modification Journal that may surprise many of you and will definitely give you some ideas as to how it is possible to decrease the amount of teens that start smoking every day.

The article “Monitoring and Decreasing Public Smoking Among Youth.” begins by talking about how smoking is the most preventable cause of death in the United States and the fact that most people start smoking during their teen years (681). The author acknowledges that even though the percentage of teens smoking cigarettes has decreased in the past few years, the number of new teens smoking every day is still way above the desired number of the US Department of Human Health and Services. They believe that an optimal percentage can be reached by creating programs that decrease the availability and access of cigarettes by teens. (681).

Reducing youth access to tobacco products seems like a good strategy as “higher rates of retail tobacco availability were associated with higher rates of smoking initiation among youth.” (682). Reducing the amount of cigarettes available to teens in stores however, doesn’t necessarily mean a substantial decrease in smoking as most of them will try to acquire cigarettes socially through a friend or relative.

Another good strategy stated in the article is that of increasing the bans in tobacco for minors and incrementing the fines they would have to pay if they are caught in possession of the substance. This would ultimately produce fear in teens and would encourage many of them to quit smoking or simply stop smoking in public areas, which then means less negative leaders and a decrease in smoking in teen social events. (683). This is supported by the study of Jason, Pokorny, and Schoeny carried out in 2003 in which “in an eight-town randomized study, white youth who lived in communities with strict enforcement of tobacco sales and possession laws had significantly less increases in tobacco use over time than those living in communities with only moderate enforcement of tobacco sales laws.”(684).

An experiment was carried out in which four towns within Chicago were selected and carefully examined. In each town, a place of gathering was selected. Two were shopping malls, the third was a fast food restaurant and the last was a Public Park. Scientists counted the number of teens smoking throughout a period of several days and recorded their observations. Consequently, they decided to start handing out smoking fines in one of the shopping mall locations and the fast food restaurant. After a few days, the number of teens smoking in these two areas had decreased tremendously as opposed to the other two places (the other mall and the public park) were nothing was done. (687).

The author analyzes these results by concluding that “after implementing possession law

enforcement intervention, rates of public smoking among youth decreased dramatically.” (688).
After stating the conclusions, the article goes on to say that the short term goal is not to eliminate smoking teens as it is very unrealistic, but rather decrease the amount of teens that start smoking every day. The experiment seems very simple, but carrying this out across the United States and actually enforcing the laws is very complicated, expensive and time consuming. Well mates I hope you enjoyed the article, and if any of you wish to keep your children or young siblings away from cigarettes, you know what to do. Good day lads.

“Monitoring and Decreasing Public Smoking Among Youth.” Behavior Modification Journals. Leonard A. Jason, Steven B. Pokorny, Julia R. Sanem and Monica L. Adams

Volume 30 (September 1, 2006): pages 681-692. 19 February 2007.