The impact of school smoking policies and student perceptions of enforcement on school smoking prevalence and location of smoking

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to comprehensively assess the impact of school tobacco policy intention, implementation and students' perceptions of policy enforcement on smoking rates and location of tobacco use during the school day. Data were obtained from all students in Grades 10-11 (n = 22,318) in 81 randomly selected schools from five Canadian provinces. Policy intention was assessed by coding written school tobacco policies. School administrators most familiar with the tobacco policy completed a survey to assess policy implementation. Results revealed policy intention and implementation subscales did not significantly predict school smoking prevalence but resulted in moderate prediction of tobacco use on school property (R(2) = 0.21-0.27). Students' perceptions of policy enforcement significantly predicted school smoking prevalence (R(2) = 0.36) and location of tobacco use (R(2) = 0.23-0.63). The research findings emphasize: (i) the need to consider both written policy intention and actual policy implementation and (ii) the existence of a policy is not effective in controlling tobacco use unless the policy is implemented and is perceived to be strongly enforced.

School and Community Predictors of Smoking: A Longitudinal Study of Canadian High Schools

“…The findings from this study build on previous research 6,14,29 in that the wider school and community context is associated with adolescent smoking. In a national sample of schools followed over 3 years, we found that schools were more likely to have low smoking rates if they had a strong focus on prevention programming and when cigarette prices near the school were higher.…”

“…Previous findings from this study have suggested that significant differences exist in tobacco retailer variables between schools with high and low smoking rates, 6,25 that smoking rates vary across schools, and that policy characteristics can explain some of this variation. 6,14,29 Evidence has also shown that community characteristics are related to smoking rates. 6 However, evidence is lacking regarding how multiple factors, across school and community environments, work in combination and over time…”

Do students’ perceptions of school smoking policies influence where students smoke?: Canada’s Youth Smoking Survey

“…Students' perceptions are an indicator of policy implementation and provide a different type of information than what is stated in an official policy document. Two studies examining the Canadian context and using similar methodology as the present study found that student perceptions of policy enforcement predicted school smoking prevalence (R 2 = 0.36) [10] when the policy itself did not and students' perceptions of policy enforcement predicted nonsmoking in elementary (OR = 0.39) but not secondary schools [19].…”

“…Since adolescents spend a large proportion of their waking hours at school, they are an ideal setting in which to implement tobacco control strategies. Schools in many developed countries, such as Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia, have adopted written smoking policies that prohibit tobacco use [7][8][9][10][11]. Such policies are meant to restrict exposure to second-hand smoke, support changes in social norms about smoking, and create a supportive environment for prevention and cessation.…”

“…It remains unclear how school policies impact adolescent smoking as literature examining the effectiveness of school policies on student smoking is mixed [10,[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. Most studies have focused upon smoking status and not all studies include measures of enforcement despite the evidence that to be effective, policies should be strongly enforced (OR = 0.34-0.86, R 2 = -0.77) [16,18,22].…”