Essay On Student Smoking

737 Words3 Pages

To fit-in with the group
Smoking evokes a feeling of acceptance and security in adolescents within new social situations. They feel that smoking makes them look more mature and independent thereby boosting their self-confidence. Smoking is also related to the reassurance of peers in their environment. For example, when a student smokes with his/her group of friends to fit in and there is a strong feeling of acceptance, they feel an urge to continue with the act to feel secure. On the contrary, if a student gets discouraged for smoking among a group of non-smokers, he/she is most likely to quit the habit. Through this act, they try to achieve a sense of independence apart from their family and create a social identity they’ve been looking for. …show more content…

This concept is related to the “intention to smoke” (Flay et al., 1983) which means that no one c force a habit upon adolescents whether it may be smoking or anything else. If a student does not have an intention to smoke, he/she will not feel the urge to smoke when offered a cigarette or when being surrounded by smoker friends. Additionally, Michell and West (1996) also claim that if a student isn’t ready to smoke he/she would avoid smoker friends and social contexts where they are likely to be offered a cigarette. Moreover, the research hypothesis is that students with an intention to smoke knowingly socialize with smokers who could guide their way into the habit and therefore they are rather excited than surprised when they are offered a cigarette to smoke. Even though it is fair that no one can force a habit upon teenagers, it is also true that they wouldn’t start smoking if they didn’t watch a peer smoke. To start a new habit, they need to be provided with certain basic knowledge like how to smoke, where to buy it from etc. This basic knowledge is most likely to be provided by their peers who smoke as compared to media or parents. In addition to that, one must acknowledge the fact that these researches were conducted over 20 years ago and that the mindset of students have changed ever

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