ArticleHealth psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association2016
Childhood self-control predicts smoking throughout life: Evidence from 21,000 cohort study participants.
Article in Health psychology : official journal of the Division of Health Psychology, American Psychological Association, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Effectiveness of Universal Self-regulation-Based Interventions in Children and Adolescents: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.JAMA pediatrics · 2018Pooled it
- Short-term nicotine deprivation alters dorsal anterior cingulate glutamate concentration and concomitant cingulate-cortical functional connectivity.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2020Trial
- Externalizing as a common genetic influence for a broad spectrum of substance use and behavioral conditions: A developmental perspective from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children.Addiction (Abingdon, England) · 2025Article
- A cross-national analysis of childhood predictors of daily smoking in adulthood.Communications medicine · 2025Article
- A novel hypothesis on the relationship between maternal education and obesity in children; the mediating role of maternal and child self-control-ABIS a population-based cohort study.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Large studies reveal how reference bias limits policy applications of self-report measures.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Linking Self-Control to Negative Risk-Taking Behavior among Chinese Late Adolescents: A Moderated Mediation Model.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Character strengths as protective factors against behavior problems in early adolescent.Psicologia, reflexao e critica : revista semestral do Departamento de Psicologia da UFRGS · 2022Article
- Health and Mindfulness during the Syndemic of SARS-CoV-2: An Ethnographic Study.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Article
- Electronic Cigarette Use Intentions Mediate the Association between Low Self-Control and Future Use by Internalizing Symptoms.Substance use & misuse · 2022Article
- Can mental health competence reduce the higher risk of smoking initiation among teenagers with parents who smoke?European journal of public health · 2021Article
- Longitudinal Predictors of Self-Regulation at School Entry: Findings from the All Our Families Cohort.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2020Article
- Increasing Smoking Cessation Adherence: Do We Need to Consider the Role of Executive Function and Rumination?Europe's journal of psychology · 2020Article
- Facets of conscientiousness and objective markers of health status.Psychology & health · 2018Article
- Facets of Conscientiousness and risk of dementia.Psychological medicine · 2018Article
- A longitudinal study of the reciprocal relationship between ever smoking and urgency in early adolescence.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2017Article
- A Bidirectional Relationship between Executive Function and Health Behavior: Evidence, Implications, and Future Directions.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2016Review
- Self-control, future orientation, smoking, and the impact of Dutch tobacco control measures.Addictive behaviors reports · 2015Article
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5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveLow self-control has been linked with smoking, yet it remains unclear whether childhood self-control underlies the emergence of lifetime smoking patterns. We examined the contribution of childhood self-control to early smoking initiation and smoking across adulthood.
methods21,132 participants were drawn from 2 nationally representative cohort studies; the 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS) and the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS). Child self-control was teacher-rated at age 10 in the BCS and at ages 7 and 11 in the NCDS. Participants reported their smoking status and number of cigarettes smoked per day at 5 time-points in the BCS (ages 26-42) and 6 time-points in the NCDS (ages 23-55). Both studies controlled for socioeconomic background, cognitive ability, psychological distress, gender, and parental smoking; the NCDS also controlled for an extended set of background characteristics.
resultsEarly self-control made a substantial graded contribution to (not) smoking throughout life. In adjusted regression models, a 1-SD increase in self-control predicted a 6.9 percentage point lower probability of smoking in the BCS, and this was replicated in the NCDS (5.2 point reduced risk). Adolescent smoking explained over half of the association between self-control and adult smoking. Childhood self-control was positively related to smoking cessation and negatively related to smoking initiation, relapse to smoking, and the number of cigarettes smoked in adulthood.
conclusionsThis study provides strong evidence that low childhood self-control predicts an increased risk of smoking throughout adulthood and points to adolescent smoking as a key pathway through which this may occur. (PsycINFO Database Record
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