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Influence of network structure and social support on black smokers' intention to stop smoking cigarettes
Abstract
Understanding the role of social and cultural factors play in promoting smoking and helping smokers to stop is a challenge that has major implications for health of black and other minority populations. Smoking is a major contributor to preventable and premature cancer mortality among blacks. Their higher rate of tobacco-related cancer is tied to a lower quitting rate, greater smoking prevalence, and greater relapse rates. The focus on racial differences in smoking has provided only a limited understanding of these disparities. Findings research on racial difference in smoking typically point to a lack of understanding of sociocultural factors as an obstacle to determining racial difference in smoking. This research is a secondary data analysis of the University of Massachusetts, School of Public Health project on "Cancer Prevention (Smoking) in Black Populations" conducted from 1986 to 1991. This research analyzed a survey administered in four major US cities to approximately fourteen hundred respondents, all black smokers. The analysis defined the networks of smokers as structural characteristics (composition and size); and in terms of socially supportive relationships. Guiding this study was the assumption that a well-defined social network model would guide researchers toward a better understanding of the influence of sociocultural factors on smoking behavior. The principal hypothesis that guided this research was that social network characteristics would be significantly related to intentions. There were three sets of study variables including demographic, network structure, and social support variables. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression models examined the independent and joint contribution of these three sets of study variables to explaining the dependent variable--intention to stop smoking in one year. Network structure and social support variables were shown to have a significant influence on smokers' intentions to stop smoking. These positive results need replication and validation with a more precise survey instrument and method for examining individuals among empirical systems.
Subject Area
Public health|Economics|Sociology
Recommended Citation
Robinson, Frank Phillip, "Influence of network structure and social support on black smokers' intention to stop smoking cigarettes" (1994). Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest. AAI9420682.
https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI9420682