Expressive writing intervention for young adult cigarette smokers

Abstract

This investigation examined the feasibility and magnitude of the effect of a stress management intervention involving expressive writing as an adjunct to brief office smoking cessation intervention for young adults. Participants aged 18-21 years were randomized to brief office intervention (N=30) or expressive writing plus brief office intervention (N=30). Biochemically confirmed 30-day point-prevalence tobacco abstinence, smoking reduction, perceived stress, negative affect, and treatment compliance were assessed at 4, 12, and 24 weeks post randomization. The expressive writing adjunct was not found to be effective. The 30-day smoking abstinence rates were 0% versus 0% ( p=1.000) at week 4, 20% versus 3% ( p=0.103) at week 12, and 20% versus 10% ( p=0.472) at week 24 for the brief office intervention only versus expressive writing plus brief office intervention groups, respectively. Participants stated they benefited most from the support and structure associated with the brief office intervention. Enthusiasm was lacking for the expressive writing treatment adjunct.

Expressive writing as a smoking cessation treatment adjunct for young adult smokers

“…The finding that participants in the expressive writing plus brief office condition initially had lower abstinence rates than participants in the brief office condition are reminiscent of those from our prior investigation (i.e., Ames et al, 2005), in which participants completed expressive writing only before cessation. In the earlier study, 6-month abstinence was lower for the expressive writing condition than for the control condition (10% vs. 20%), although this difference was not statistically significant.…”

“…This is the second published investigation exploring the use of expressive writing for smoking cessation and is an extension of a prior investigation (i.e., Ames et al, 2005). The point-prevalence abstinence rate for participants who received the expressive writing treatment adjunct was significantly higher than for those in the control condition.…”

“…A review of the past 25 years of tobacco-related research involving adolescents and young adults (Sussman, 2002), in conjunction with our own literature review, revealed only four published intervention studies involving young adults (Ames et al, 2005;Hellman, O'Shea, Kunz, & Schimpfhauser, 1988;Rutter, 1990;Suedfeld, Landon, Pargament, & Epstien, 1972). Only Rutter (1990), an uncontrolled investigation conducted in 24 university students and utilizing a behavioral smoking reduction intervention, yielded significant results, with 7 of the 24 participants being abstinent from smoking at 1 year, and 8 participants reporting a reduced rate of smoking.…”

“…The present investigation is an extension of earlier work (Ames et al, 2005) that examined the feasibility and magnitude of the effect of a stress management intervention involving expressive writing as an adjunct to brief office smoking cessation for young adults. Participants aged 18-21 years were randomized to a brief office intervention or to an expressive writing plus brief office intervention condition.…”

Evaluating guilt and shame in an expressive writing alcohol intervention

“…The majority of expressive writing studies that focus on writing about stressful events either did not examine health behavior change or did not find behavior change (Ames et al, 2005, 2007; Pennebaker et al, 1988). However, some studies have shown encouraging effects of expressive writing sessions on behavior change.…”