Our results support the hypothesis that tobacco marketing may be a stronger current influence in encouraging adolescents to initiate the smoking uptake process than exposure to peer or family smokers or sociodemographic variables including perceived school performance.

Objective -To assess the possible use fulness and validity of a new measure to identify adolescents at risk of smoking cigarettes. Design -The new measure was compared with standard ones with respect to their ability to identify young adolescents at risk of later smoking cigarettes; and the correlation between known risk factors for smoking and both the new and the standard measure of current smoking was assessed.Setting and subjects -Cross-sectional, population-based 1992 California

No abstract

To the authors' knowledge, calendar year trends in cigarette smoking initiation rates have not been examined on a population basis. National Health Interview Survey data (1970, 1978, 1979, 1980, 1987, and 1988) on age of starting to smoke fairly regularly were used to compute smoking initiation rates for males and females aged 10-24 years from 1944 through the mid-1980s. Information from 102,626 respondents was included. The authors examined trends in these rates and looked for associations with milestones in the antismoking public health campaign. Smoking initiation in 21- to 24-year-old (adult) males declined sharply beginning around 1950 when evidence regarding the health consequences of smoking was first made public. The decline in adult females began in the mid-1960s when the Surgeon General's report was released, intensifying the public health campaign. The initiation rate for adult males and females dropped below 1% by the end of the study period. Initiation rates in 15- to 20-year-old males also began to decrease in the mid-1960s, but rates for 10- to 14-year-old males did not decrease over the study period. Initiation rates for females both in the 15-20 and 10-14 year age groups actually increased, at least through the mid-1970s. These trends in smoking initiation suggest that knowing the health consequences of smoking has kept adults from starting to smoke. Such knowledge either may be lacking or may not be salient among the youngest age groups.

OBJECTIVES. In the face of rising costs of surveillance systems, it is time to reexamine the feasibility of including proxy respondents in surveys designed to provide population estimates of smoking prevalence. METHODS. Data are from the California. Tobacco Surveys, which are random-digit dialed telephone surveys. One adult provided demographic information and smoking status for all household residents. Additionally, some adults were selected for in-depth interviews that also included smoking status questions. We matched information from proxy respondents and self-respondents and evaluated smoking status discrepancies between them relative to demographic and other factors (n = 2930 matched pairs) in 1992. We address the potential bias these discrepancies might introduce into the population estimate of smoking prevalence. RESULTS. Overall, the discrepancy between proxy report and self-report was 4.3%, and it increased particularly when the self-respondent reported nondaily smoking or recent quitting. Discrepancies acted in both directions, and the net bias was that the screener survey overestimated smoking prevalence by 0.1% in 1992 (0.3% in 1990). CONCLUSIONS. Smoking status questions can be added to ongoing surveys such as the census or labor force surveys; one adult could provide smoking status for all household members.