263648 Adolescent sexual orientation and smoking: Intersections with age, race/ethnicity, and gender

Wednesday, October 31, 2012 : 10:45 AM - 11:00 AM

Heather L. Corliss, MPH, PhD , Division of Adolescent/Young Adult Medicine, Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA
Michelle Birkett, PhD , Department of Medical Social Sciences, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL
Michael E. Newcomb, PhD , Department of Psychology, University of Illinois, Chicago, IL
Margaret Rosario, PhD , Department of Psychology, The City University of New York - City College and Graduate Center, New York, NY
Alicia Matthews, PhD , Department of Public Health, Mental Health, and Administrative Nursing, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL
Francisco Buchting, PhD , Program Services Division, ETR Associates, Scotts Valley, CA
Sexual-minority adolescents are more likely to smoke cigarettes than heterosexual adolescents. However, relatively little is known about how age, race/ethnicity, and gender influence sexual-orientation disparities in smoking, but this information could assist with developing interventions to reduce smoking. Using Youth Risk Behavior Survey data pooled from 14 locations and 2 years (weighted N>34,000), we examined how age, race/ethnicity, and gender modified relationships between sexual orientation and smoking. Results suggested a complex pattern of interactions. With respects to positive histories of smoking, sexual-minority females (69%) were more likely to have ever smoked than sexual-minority males (58%), while gender differences in heterosexuals were negligible (females=45%, males=46%; pinteraction<.0001). Additionally, sexual-orientation disparities in ever smoking were accentuated in younger relative to older adolescents (pinteraction<.01). With regards to patterns of current smoking (mean number of cigarettes smoked in the past month), disparities were larger in sexual-minority males (e.g., bisexuals=55 cigarettes, unsure=23) than females (bisexuals=34, unsure=10) relative to gender differences in heterosexuals (males=13, females=8) (pinteractions<.001). Similarly, sexual-orientation disparities in the number of cigarettes smoked in the past month were accentuated in older relative to younger adolescents (pinteraction<.0001) and in whites relative to Blacks, Asian/Pacific Islanders, and Latinos (pinteractions<.001). Findings suggest that female and younger sexual-minority adolescents have higher relative-risks for histories of smoking, but male, white, and older sexual-minority adolescents have relatively higher amounts of current smoking. Our findings that sexual-orientation disparities in the amount of current smoking are accentuated in males and older adolescents diverge from some prior evidence. Findings related to race/ethnicity are novel.

Learning Areas:
Advocacy for health and health education
Diversity and culture
Epidemiology
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs
Public health or related research

Learning Objectives:
1. Describe how age, race/ethnicity, and gender are related to sexual-orientation disparities in adolescent smoking. 2. Identify sexual-minority adolescent subpopulations based on age, race/ethnicity, and gender that are at disproportionate risk for smoking. 3. Recognize the importance of considering how sexual orientation intersects with other demographic factors for developing and targeting interventions to reduce adolescent smoking.

Keywords: Smoking, Adolescents

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I conducted the research and have 14 years of experience conducting research on LGBT health.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.