(HealthDayNews) -- It is widely known -- except to an extraordinarily high number of adolescents -- that smoking enhances your chances of dying young.
A recent study has found some reasons why, despite extensive efforts to encourage kids to not smoke, that message isn't being heard or is being ignored.
Researchers at the Georgetown University School of Medicine and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine report that adolescent depression, combined with high receptivity to tobacco advertising, plays a powerful role in whether a teen smokes. The National Institute on Drug Abuse, which sponsored the study, says the results "demonstrate the complex interplay of factors that influence the initiation of smoking by youth."
"Adolescents with elevated levels of depression may find the messages delivered by tobacco advertisements more appealing than adolescents without elevated levels of depression," says the senior author of the study, Dr. Janet Audrain of the University of Pennsylvania.
Dr. Audrain's research team surveyed 1,123 high school freshmen, 60 percent of whom reported that they had never smoked, and 40 percent reported having smoked at least a partial or whole cigarette. Across both groups, 34 percent had high receptivity to cigarette advertising -- defined as the ability to name an often-advertised cigarette brand, to name a favorite tobacco ad, and willingness to use a tobacco industry product.
Researchers found that, overall, more adolescents with high receptivity to tobacco advertising had smoked, as compared to those with low receptivity, and these results were further affected by depression.
