Predictors of Arab American adolescent tobacco use

Abstract

This study examined personal, psychosocial, sociocultural, and environmental predictors in tobacco use for 1671 Arab American adolescents. Cigarette smoking in past 30 days was 6.9%. This increased from 1% at age 14 to 14% at age 18. Twenty-nine percent of the youths reported ‘ever cigarette smoking.’ Experimentation with narghile was 27%; it increased from 23% at 14 years to 40% at 18 years. All trends were significant (p < .001). Logistic regression analyses found ten predictors for ‘smoked a cigarette in past 30 days’ and nine and seven, respectively, for ‘ever smoked a cigarette or narghile’. Friends and family members smoking were the strongest predictors of cigarette smoking and ‘ever narghile use.’ ‘Ever narghile use’ supported cigarette smoking.