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This study has been designed to investigate adolescent smokers' perception of cigarette advertising and cigarette health warnings. Specifically, the study focuses on the following research questions: (a) What are adolescents' attitudes toward (1) image enhancement themes conveyed by cigarette advertising, and (2) cigarette health warnings? (b) Do motives for smoking influence the way they assess these image-enhancing themes? (c) Do these motives influence the way adolescent smokers assess the deterrent effectiveness of cigarette health warnings? A total of 129 adolescents (63 males, 66 females) drawn from Grades 10, 11, and 12 from high schools within the Darwin metropolitan area were included in the sample. All the respondents satisfied the criterion of selection as “current regular smokers”. Factor analysis of their responses to a smoking inventory yielded three distinct motives for smoking — Social Acceptance, Pleasure, and Addiction/Habitual Needs. Multiple regression analysis indicated that these motives exert differential influence on the way male and female adolescent smokers assess advertising themes. Further analysis indicated that the respondents' assessment of the deterrent effectiveness of cigarette health warnings also depended on their motives for smoking. The implications of these findings to health education programs are discussed.
Robert Ho (Tue,) studied this question.