Despite smoking's documented health risks, teens may be more worried about its damage to their wallets, a new study suggests.
High school students surveyed in the study were most likely to say they wanted to quit smoking to save money, according to Lindsey Turner, Ph.D., and Robin Mermelstein, Ph.D., of the University of Illinois at Chicago. Their study appears in the American Journal of Health Behavior.
Health concerns and their parents' wishes that the teens would quit smoking were the next most common reasons given for wanting to quit.
"Adolescents report a variety of reasons for wanting to quit, but health, image and financial considerations are the most common," Turner says.
Girls seem to be more concerned with smoking's effects on their image and looks, such as nicotine stains on fingers and teeth. Boys, on the other hand, say they would like to quit smoking to improve their athletic performance.
The researchers discovered, however, that the most common reasons given for wanting to quit weren't always the reasons that seemed to help teens kick the habit.
Students who gave up their cigarettes were more likely to have said earlier that they didn't enjoy smoking as much as they thought they would, or that their friends wanted them to quit. Teens who were highly motivated to quit smoking at the beginning of the program were also among the successful quitters.