Smoking habit spills down to your kids, study shows

A new research has revealed that parents who are addicted to smoking can lead their kids towards heavy smoking very quickly and easily.

Lead author Darren Mays, a public health researcher with the Cancer Prevention & Control Program at the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center of Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, D.C, said, “Our results suggest that for parents who are addicted smokers (quitting) may also reduce the likelihood that their children will go on to become smokers in the future.”

The research took 400 teens from early to late adolescence as subjects. Of the 24 kids who were already regular smokers at age 14, two-thirds had a parent, who was a current smoker, compared to three with a parent that was a former smoker and five with nonsmoking parents.

“There is strong evidence of this relationship for both tobacco and alcohol,” said Mike Vuolo, associate director of the Center for Research on Young People’s Health at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, who was not involved in the new study.

“The best advice for any parent who smokes is to quit as soon as possible and that resources such as their family doctor, telephone quit lines and online programs are available to help,” Mays said.

Agencies/Canadajournal