Study Links On-Screen Smoking and Actual Smoking in Young Adults

Results of a study made public Tuesday may provide some statistical legitimacy to the phrase, "monkey see, monkey do." Researchers from the University of California at San Francisco found a strong correlation between exposure to on-screen smoking and the development of smoking in young adults.

While earlier studies have linked seeing smoking in movies and emulating the behavior among teenagers, the UCSF study was unique in that it focused on the 18-25 age group. This is significant because it is during these years that smoking develops into a lifelong behavior. In other words, it is the time when smoking proves itself to be either a passing teenage phase or a lifelong addiction.

"Ages 18 to 25 are critical years, when one-third of smokers start and others who began smoking as adolescents either stop smoking or become regular smokers," said Stanton Glantz, PhD, professor of medicine and director of the Center for Tobacco Research and Education at UCSF.

The study, of which Glantz is the senior author, will be published in the November edition of the "American Journal of Preventative Medicine." The results indicated a "dose-response relationship" between the exposure to smoking in movies and the likelihood of having smoked in the past 30 days. Of the participants, those who saw the most on screen smoking had a 77 percent greater chance of having smoked at least once in the last 30 days. In addition, this group had an 86 percent increased chance of being regular, established smokers as compared to those who were exposed to little on-screen smoking.

"The main effect is to recruit new smokers from among young adults," said Glantz. In addition to recruiting new smokers, the study also showed a direct effect between exposure and current smoking habits. Two mediating factors were cited in this relationship: exposure to friends and relatives who smoke and positive expectations about smoking.

To conduct the study, researchers recruited a sample of 1,528 young adults who represented an accurate cross section of Americans between the ages of 18 and 25. This was established by studying a group with 24.7 of its members identified as smokers. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that 25.3 percent of all Americans within the age range are smokers.

To determine how much on-screen smoking they had been exposed to, each participant was given a list of 60 movies randomly selected from the top 500 grossing films from 2000-2004. The participants indicated which of the movies they had seen, and were placed into one of four exposure-level groups based on their selections.

The study also showed that exposure to smoking in movies had a more profound effect on smoking behavior than tobacco promotion at campus social events and in clubs and bars. The odds of smoking in a 30-day period were increased by a factor of 1.77 for on-screen smoking, compared to a factor of 1.75 for exposure to actual, targeted tobacco promotion.

In the United States, lung cancer, commonly related to smoking, is the leading cause of cancer in men and women. Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death nationally, claiming 440,000 lives each year. According to Glantz, due to the recruitment power of on-screen tobacco use, the reduction of smoking content in films has the potential to prevent a significant number of tobacco deaths.

"Movies encourage [young adults] to experiment, and once they start experimenting with cigarettes, other factors take hold," he said. "Movies create the expectation that smoking will turn out okay."

SOURCES:

Press Release, University of California - San Francisco

NCI Fact Sheet, National Cancer Institute

SEER Cancer Statistics Review, National Cancer Institute