Social network tie functions of social support and social influence and adult smoking abstinence

Abstract

Adults’ social network ties serve multiple functions and play prominently in quitting smoking. We examined three types of adults’ egocentric social networks, including family, friends, and friends online to investigate how two network characteristics with major relevance to health behavior, network size and tie closeness, related to the emotional and confidant support and to pro- and anti-smoking social influence these ties may transmit. We also examine whether the social support and social influence constructs related to smoking abstinence. We utilized baseline and 7-day abstinence survey data from 123 adult current smokers attempting to quit prior to the start of a randomized controlled quit-smoking trial of a social support intervention for quitting smoking on Twitter. To examine study relationships, we estimated Negative Binomial Regression models and Logistic Regression models. For all networks, network size and tie closeness related positively to most of the social support and social influence constructs, with tie closeness related most strongly, especially for online friends. Family pro-smoking social influence related negatively to smoking abstinence, and there were marginally negative relationships for family emotional support and family confidant support. Online friend emotional support had a marginally positive relationship with smoking abstinence. Overall, our findings indicated the importance of the social support and social influence functions of each type of network tie, with larger networks and closer ties related to higher levels of social support and social influence. Moreover, family network pro-smoking social influence may compromise abstinence while emotional support from online friend network ties may reinforce it.