Do Youth Assets Protect Young Adults from Tobacco Use: A Prospective Association

Purpose: Developmental assets protect adolescents from risk behaviors, including tobacco use. However little is known about their influence in the transition to young adulthood and if relationships vary by gender.

Methods: Prospective analyses were conducted on waves 4 and 5 of annual data collected from 450 randomly-selected ethnically-diverse young adults (ages 17-21) and their parents in the Youth Asset Study. Ten developmental assets were examined, including Family Communication, Non-Parental Adult Role Models, and Aspirations for the Future. Logistic regression stratified by gender (females=253), controlling for demographic variables, was used to prospectively examine the association between developmental assets (wave 4) and tobacco use in the last 30 days in the following year (wave 5).

Results: Four assets in young adults were significantly associated with later tobacco use. Young adult females without the Family Communication asset were 1.97 times, Relationship with Mother 2.55 times, and Non-Parental Adult Role Models 2.28 times more likely to report tobacco use the following year than those with the asset. For young adult males,those without the Parental Monitoring asset were 2.97 times more likely to report tobacco use the next year than those with the asset. The Positive Peer Role Models asset was significantly associated with later tobacco use for both genders.

Conclusions: Relationships with significant adults continue to protect against tobacco use in young adulthood, but their influence differs by gender. Tobacco use prevention programs targeting young adults can build on established relationships in adolescence to protect against tobacco use in young adulthood.