Peer and Selection Effects on Youth Smoking in California

Abstract

Previous research has found that youth smoking choices are strongly influenced by peer smoking. However, these studies often fail to account for simultaneity and nonrandom peer selection. This article describes an equilibrium model of peer effects that incorporates both of these features, and estimates its parameters using data on California teenagers. Identification is aided by using the influence of observable variables on group selection as a proxy for the influence of unobservables. I find that the effect of peer smoking on the decision to smoke is much weaker than found in previous studies.

Cigarette taxes and youth smoking: New evidence from national, state, and local Youth Risk Behavior Surveys

“…An increase in cigarette taxes may make potential sources more reluctant to provide youths with cigarettes, or lead them to charge more. The prevalence of smoking among friends and family may also be influential through social contagion processes (Krauth, 2005;Powell and Chaloupka, 2005, and others), so that the increase in taxes influences youth smoking indirectly by influencing the smoking rates in their social environment. Perhaps the best interpretation of our results is that they reflect a reduced form of direct and indirect influences on youth decisions.…”

“It wasn’t me, it was them!” Social influence in risky behavior by adolescents

“…Both Krauth (2005Krauth ( , 2006 and Kawaguchi (2004) consider social interactions from friends, the former with respect to cigarettes, and the latter with respect to cigarettes, alcohol and marijuana, but using the individual's own report of their friends' behavior. In Table 4, the increase in probability of individual smoking is 4.6% from male friends and 5.2% from female friends.…”

“…is one example of paper using a one-period lag to measure interdependent preferences in a system of demand equations Woittiez and Kapteyn (1998). use lagged reference group behavior in the estimation of labor supply.4 Other studies use measures of peer behavior,Ȳ j , as reported directly by individual i, in different ways to estimate social interactions, as inKawaguchi (2004) andKrauth (2005Krauth ( , 2006. However,Norton et al (2003) show that regression estimators are inconsistent when the correctly-measured group behavior variable is replaced by perceived measures from survey respondents.…”

Youth smoking, cigarette prices, and anti‐smoking sentiment

“…Social psychology research suggests that peers have a powerful influence on youth smoking (Tyas and Pederson, 1998), but identifying causal peer effects in an econometric study is extremely challenging (Manski, 1993). Econometric studies of peer effects on youth smoking reach mixed results; for example using an instrumental variables approach Powell et al (2005) find large peer effects, but using alternative identification strategies Eisenberg (2004) and Krauth (2004) find smaller peer effects. Regarding the results listed in Table V, the measure of state anti-smoking sentiment may be correlated with peer pressure.…”