Beliefs of Smoking and Nonsmoking College Students about the Effects of Environmental Tobacco Smoke and Related Issues

Abstract

The purpose of the present investigation was to survey beliefs on the aversiveness of environmental tobacco smoke held by smoking and nonsmoking college students. A few questions were also included on several closely related issues including the health hazards of smoking to smokers. Analysis was made of a thirty-one item section from a longer questionnaire that had been administered to sixty-one smoking and 246 nonsmoking college students at the University of New Hampshire. Although nonsmokers expressed a statistically significant degree of belief in most of the environmental smoke items there was considerable room for the beliefs to develop strength. In general smokers expressed slightly more skepticism or uncertainty. Both groups expressed quite strong levels of belief on a general statement on health hazards but considerably less strong belief on statements dealing with specific hazards. The question is raised whether most people really have an effective understanding of the health hazards.