According to a study out of the University of Georgia, there is a not-so-good side-effect of ads aimed at stopping kids from smoking: they may actually encourage smoking. It turns out that the campaigns may actually strike a chord a cross-section of youth, and provide a clear way that kids can rebel.
Paek said the data showed middle school students are more likely to be influenced by the perception of what their friends are doing, and that anti-smoking campaigns should be more focused on peer relations.
“Rather than saying, ‘Don’t smoke,’ it is better to say, ‘Your friends are listening to this message and not smoking,’” she said. “It doesn’t really matter what their peers are actually doing.”
This is a fantastic embodiment of how everything has a shadow side, even the most well-intentioned efforts.
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PsychBLOG.co.uk » Health promotion and awareness carnival (2/16/2008)
3 Comments to
“Side-Effect of Anti-Smoking Ads”
I think it is a fantastic example of how difficult it is to predict the consequences of any particular action or intervention – due to the extremely complex network of variables at work in any given situation. This should be kept in mind, especially any time we think that we know what we are doing.
I know every time I see one of those ads I want to smoke. And I’m in my 20s. It just makes me want to do it just to show them they can’t tell me what to do. Maybe they should put commercials on encouraging… no ORDERING kids to smoke. They’d never touch a cig.
There is a well-known phenomena in psychology, which goes something like this:
The more energy (attention) you give to a problem, the more it exists.
This doesn’t mean that “we” should ignore the smoking problem. But it does mean that far more care should be taken with the -kind- of attention given to preventing addiction to smoking (and to anything, for that matter). It’s more than clear by now that simply saying “Just Say No” doesn’t work at all. What’s needed is a real understanding of why people smoke in the first place…especially, in this case, why underage people start smoking. The catch-all phrase “peer pressure” just doesn’t cut it. Without this information, most any attempt to stem the tide of addiction will be wasted effort.
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 26 Jul 2007
