Cheyenne Mallery

Ms. McKoy

English 2

October 4, 2012

A Period of Increaded Susceptibility to Cigarette Smoking Among High School Students

            Filice et al argues that when teens smoke, they experience five stages of preparation. They also argued that they are more capable of being susceptible (being affected emotionally). The authors also argue that the susceptible youth are two to four times more likely to smoke later in adolescence. They claim that the first stage of smoking is the preparatory stage; the teens build stronger attitudes and beliefs about it. The second stage is the “trying” stage. This means that adolescents start to try smoking. Stage three is the experimental stage which is when the smokers try different things with smoking. Stages four and five sort of tie in with each other. These two stages are regular usage, and addiction. Filice, Hannan, Lando, and Joseph also claim that susceptible youth are two to four times more likely to smoke later on in their life as a teenager or young adult. A third statement made by the authors is that “short-term periods of increased susceptibility might represent important opportunities for prevention to smoke. To make these claims, the authors first studied and experimented adolescents. Filice, Hannan, Lando, and Joseph surveyed teenagers to see how tobacco related to knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors.

             The purpose of this article is to share the purpose and findings of the surveys that they gave out. They took students from 9^th to 12^th grade and put the results into graphs. The students were anywhere on a scale from susceptible, but never smoked to committed non-smoker, to some experience with smoking. This work is significant to my topic because it brings up the fact that smoking may affect student’s knowledge. That was part of the research that they did.

 

Works Cited

Harry A. Lando, et al. "A Period Of Increased Susceptibility To Cigarette Smoking Among High School Students." Journal Of School Health 73.7 (2003): 272-278. Academic Search Premier. Web. 5 Oct. 2012.