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Peer Pressure Helps Snuff Habit

Posted May 22, 08 9:58 AM CDT in Science & Health 

(Newser) – New research shows people quit smoking not as individuals but in complex social clusters, each strongly influencing the others. Friends, spouses, relatives, and other social contacts all exercise an overwhelming sway over individual decisions to quit. The study covered 58,000 people from 1971 to 2003, the New York Times reports, when smoking declined precipitously across the US.

“We tend to think of individuals as atomized units, and we think of policies as good or bad for individuals,” said the principal research scientist at Yahoo Research in New York. “This reminds us that we are all connected to each other, and when we do something to one person, there are spillover effects.”

Source New York Times

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Smokers are heavily influenced by friends and family members to quit.   (Getty Images)
Smokers quit in inter related clusters of three, each cluster heavily influencing another, according to a breakthrough new study.   (Getty Images)
Breakthrough new research offers new insight into how smokers are influenced to quit.   (Getty Images (by Event) Individuals)
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smoking  • smoking cessation  • Harvard Medical School  • National Institute on Aging


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