Share Youth & Adult Smoking Research

PI: Arthur V. Peterson, Jr., PhD

Goals

• To learn more about teens' attitudes and practices about smoking and non-smoking
• To learn how teens change in their smoking attitudes and practices as they become young adults.
• To develop and test interventions for smoking prevention and smoking cessation, and find out to what extent they can help teens avoid and/or quit smoking.

Importance

• Teens are at risk for taking up smoking.
• Smoking kills. Approximately 438,000 Americans die from smoking related illnesses each year.
• Smoking causes lung cancer. Cigarette smoking alone is directly responsible for approximately 30% of all cancer deaths annually in the United States, and 87% of lung cancer deaths. Lung cancer is the deadliest form of cancer, killing more people than breast, colon, and prostate cancer combined.
• Cigarette smoking is the single most preventable cause of death in the United States.
• Avoiding tobacco use is the single most important step Americans can take to reduce the cancer burden in this country.

Research Areas

• Youth: predictors of smoking acquisition, and ways to help youth avoid smoking
• Youth: ways to help teen smokers to quit
• Young adults: predictors of smoking 

Major Findings
Research Priorities
Previous Studies
Contact Information
Help with Quitting Smoking