Smoking identity of African American adolescents: How do current smokers view their behavior?

The idea that someone would smoke cigarettes, perhaps even regularly, and say he/she is a “nonsmoker” is one that is hard to comprehend. However, we believe many teenagers smoke cigarettes, but would not call themselves a “smoker.” We investigated the personal smoking status of African American adolescents living in Jackson, Mississippi. We examined those who indicated they had smoked in the past 30 days to determine if social aspects or attitudes related to smoking have an impact on their self-perceived smoking identity. Students were asked to label themselves as: a “nonsmoker,” “someone who smokes every once in a while,” a “regular smoker” or an “ex-smoker.” Data were collected from African American high school students who indicated they had smoked in the past 30 days (N=346) and therefore currently smoked cigarettes. The category chosen least often was “ex smoker” (11.6%), followed by “nonsmoker” (21.1%), “regular smokers” (30.9%), and “someone who smokes once in a while” (36.4%). Significant differences were found among the four smoking identity categories by gender (p<0.001), home smoking restrictions (p<0.001), being in the same room as a smoker (p<0.001), being in a car with a smoker (p=0.001), living with a smoker (p<0.001), friends smoking (p<0.001), feel that smoking is dangerous (p<0.001), feel susceptible to future smoking (p<0.001), practicing saying no to smoking (p=0.02), accepting cigarettes from fiends (p<0.001), receiving (p<0.03) and wearing (p=0.001) apparel with tobacco paraphernalia. Investigating personal labels can be beneficial to developing intervention programs that take into account the perceived needs of the individual smoker.