The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA

Abstract #63728

Huey-Shys Chen, PhD, RN, CHES, 911 NW 106th Street, Gainesville, FL 32606, Xiao-Yu Yan, RN, MSN, Department of Nursing, Ta-Jen Institute of Technology, 20 Weishin Road, Yanpu Shiang, Ping-Tung County, 907, Taiwan, 886-87624002, beauvoir@ccsun.tajen.edu.tw, and Jiunn-Jye Sheu, MSPH, PhD, CHES, Department of Health Science Education, University of Florida, FLG 5, PO Box 118210, Gainesville, FL 32611-8210.

The purpose of this research was to examine the application of the stages of change framework to adolescents°¦ smoking behavior in Taipei; and to assess relationships of the stages of change with self-efficacy and decisional balance in school-age children. A self-administered structured questionnaire survey was collected. Four instruments, the STAQ, the SE, and the DBS scales were used to gather data in this study. A random sample of 568 seventh, eighth, and ninth grade students was recruited from two junior high schools in Taipei. The results of this study showed that (1) for the stages of smoking of adolescents, there were three stages labeled as precontemplation, decision making, and maintenance, emerged from the principle component factor analysis, (2) students who were at precontemplation stage had significant higher self-efficacy to resist in starting smoking than those who were at decision making stage or maintenance stage, and (3) the decision makers and the maintainers weighed the advantages of smoking greater than the disadvantages of smoking, in contrast to the precontemplators' decision making. Although the findings of this study were different from the original model, they provided preliminary evidence that there were three stages of smoking behavior. The study findings suggested health educators and school nurses use stage-specific skills to develop effective smoking prevention programs.

Learning Objectives:

• 1.the audience will be able to learn the application of TTM to the smoking acquisition behavior
• 2.the audience will be able to compare the differences of a behavior change between his own culture and chinese culture.
• 3.the audience will be ablet to recognize the change of self efficacy and decisional balance across smoking behavior.

Keywords: Smoking, Adolescents, International

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.