Prevalence and Determinants of Smoking among the College Students in Selected District of Bangladesh

Abstract

Abstract:Cigarette smoking is an intractable public health problem that poses threat to the health of the entire population. Smoking is considered as the single largest risk factor for a variety of malignancies, including lung cancer. The prevalence of smoking is gradually increasing among the students in Bangladesh. Considering this view, this cross sectional study was conducted in a selected higher secondary college of Moulvibazar district under Sylhet division. The objectives of the study were to determine the proportion of current smokers and its determinants among the college students. A total of 719 students were interviewed using self administered questionnaire. The mean age (SD) of the students was 17.1(SD 1.5) years ranging from 15 to 22 years. Majority of the respondents were male (57.4%) and 42.6% were female with male-female ratio of 1.3:1. Out of 719 students, 22% were current smokers and the rest 78% were non smokers. Half of the students reportedly mentioned that they started smoking due to peer pressure followed by curiosity (34%), to avoid anxiety and tension (28%), feeling of maturity (14%, symbol of manliness (9%) etc. The most frequent form of smoking was cigarette(56%) followed by Bidi (37%), Hukkah (6%) and 2% hand made cigarette. The mean age of starting smoking was 13(SD 2.9) years ranging from 9 to 20 years. More than one third (35%) of the student's father were smokers, whereas 11.5% of their brothers were smokers. Logistic analysis revealed that only age, sex and educational attainment appeared to be important predictors of smoking (p<0.001). This indicates that the smoking was 4.26 times high among male students than their female counterparts. It was 2

Prevalence and determinants of smoking in some selected private university students of Dhaka city

“…A study was conducted on prevalence and determinants of smoking among the university students of Bangladesh found 22.1% of them as smokers. 9 Higher prevalence of smoking in this study may be due to peer pressure as 85.3% of the respondents lived with their friends and hostel. This result is similar to a study conducted in Jordan to assess the smoking habit among university students: prevalence and associated factors in 2008 where majority (86.3%) of smokers smoked daily.…”

Family and peer effect on young and adolescent smoking in Bangladesh

“…The prevalence of smoking among the college students included in this study corresponds to the rate of the study by Tarafdar [24] where students in a higher secondary college in the Moulvibazar district of Bangladesh were the study participants. In another study of college students studying in private and public colleges in three towns of Karachi, Pakistan, [27,28] it was 24 per cent.…”

“…Understanding the role of family and peer effect on smoking is vital for developing smoking prevention and cessation interventions in Bangladesh. There are few studies from Bangladesh which examined the correlates of smoking behaviour among young adults and adolescents [21][22][23][24].…”

Prevalence and factors associated with cigarette smoking among resident university students: A crosssectional study from Bangladesh

“…From the literature, the majority of university students start smoking due to the influence of friends. Students who have more smoker friends are more likely to become smokers [7][8][9] . They also start smoking by imitating their smoker family members 7 and through curiosity [7][8][9] .…”

“…Students who have more smoker friends are more likely to become smokers [7][8][9] . They also start smoking by imitating their smoker family members 7 and through curiosity [7][8][9] . The prevalence of cigarette smoking was found higher in students who live away from home and have higher living expenditures 8 .…”