To reduce New Zealanders’ exposure to second-hand smoke and denormalise smoking behaviour, smoking is prohibited in a range of places, including indoor areas of work and licensed premises, and the grounds and buildings of schools and early childhood centres (The Smoke-free Environments Amendment Act, 2003). Possible ways to further reduce young people’s second-hand smoke exposure include extending the range of smokefree settings to areas where they are likely to be eg, vehicles, recreation parks. The Health Promotion Agency’s (HPA’s) Youth Insights Survey (YIS) monitors Year 10 students’ behaviours, attitudes and knowledge on a range of tobacco-related topics, including their opinions on extending smoking bans.
Methodology
To regularly monitor young people’s opinions about tobacco control and aid the development of appropriate health promotion strategies, respondents in the 2012 YIS answered a few questions about their opinion on extending smokefree areas.
Responses to these questions were examined by:
•smoking status
1.never smoked
2.current smokers (smoke at least monthly)
3.ex (no longer smoke) and experimental (smoke less often than monthly) smokers
•susceptibility to smoking
1.non-susceptible never smokers (who said they would ‘definitely not’ accept a cigarette offered by their best friend or smoke a cigarette during the next 12 months)
2.susceptible never smokers
•ethnicity
•gender.
Key Results
- There was high agreement (88%) among young people with banning smoking in cars while children are in them. The majority also agreed that smoking bans should be extended to all outdoor places where young people go (73%).
- Young people most likely to agree with extending smoking bans were those who had never smoked, had not been exposed to second-hand smoke during the past week, and were female.
- Although current smokers were less likely than others to agree with extending smoking bans, around two-thirds did agree with a smoking ban in cars while children are present, and one-third with a smoking ban in outdoor places where young people go (Figure 1).