Biomaterial Database

Cigarette smoking among junior and senior high school students in Japan. 1996

Y Osaki, and M Minowa

Department of Epidemiology, Institute of Public Health, Tokyo, Japan.

OBJECTIVE To estimate the smoking prevalence among junior and senior high school students in Japan. METHODS We conducted a nationwide survey of adolescent smoking habits in 1990. Sample schools were selected by single random sampling. Self-administered anonymous questionnaires were sent to sample schools for all students to fill out. Seventy junior high schools and 33 senior high schools responded. A total of 57,189 students responded. RESULTS The current smoking rate (the proportion of students who had smoked at least once during the previous month) was much higher among boys than girls. The current smoking rate among seventh graders was 4.0% for boys and 1.5% for girls, and it increased with age to reach 25.5% for boys and 4.9% for girls in the twelfth grade. The percentage of regular smokers in the seventh grade was less than 1% for both sexes, but it increased to 20.3% for boys and 2.2% for girls in twelfth grade. Among current smokers, the proportion of boys smoking 1-9 cigarettes per day decreased, and the proportion of boys smoking 10 or more cigarettes per day increased, as age increased. Most current smokers buy their cigarettes from cigarette vending machines or tobacconist shops. CONCLUSIONS Since this survey reveals that smoking prevalence among students is not low even in junior high school, health education about smoking must start earlier and carry a greater emphasis within the curriculum. These results also indicate the importance of urging families to have greater concern for the smoking behavior of their children, of banning cigarette vending machines, and of preventing illegal sale of cigarettes to anyone under the age of 20 years.

UI	MeSH Term	Description	Entries
D007564	Japan	A country in eastern Asia, island chain between the North Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Japan, east of the Korean Peninsula. The capital is Tokyo.	Bonin Islands
D008297	Male		Males
D011795	Surveys and Questionnaires	Collections of data obtained from voluntary subjects. The information usually takes the form of answers to questions, or suggestions.	Community Survey,Nonrespondent,Questionnaire,Questionnaires,Respondent,Survey,Survey Method,Survey Methods,Surveys,Baseline Survey,Community Surveys,Methodology, Survey,Nonrespondents,Questionnaire Design,Randomized Response Technique,Repeated Rounds of Survey,Respondents,Survey Methodology,Baseline Surveys,Design, Questionnaire,Designs, Questionnaire,Methods, Survey,Questionnaire Designs,Questionnaires and Surveys,Randomized Response Techniques,Response Technique, Randomized,Response Techniques, Randomized,Survey, Baseline,Survey, Community,Surveys, Baseline,Surveys, Community,Techniques, Randomized Response
D011897	Random Allocation	A process involving chance used in therapeutic trials or other research endeavor for allocating experimental subjects, human or animal, between treatment and control groups, or among treatment groups. It may also apply to experiments on inanimate objects.	Randomization,Allocation, Random
D005260	Female		Females
D006801	Humans	Members of the species Homo sapiens.	Homo sapiens,Man (Taxonomy),Human,Man, Modern,Modern Man
D000293	Adolescent	A person 13 to 18 years of age.	Adolescence,Youth,Adolescents,Adolescents, Female,Adolescents, Male,Teenagers,Teens,Adolescent, Female,Adolescent, Male,Female Adolescent,Female Adolescents,Male Adolescent,Male Adolescents,Teen,Teenager,Youths
D012907	Smoking	Willful or deliberate act of inhaling and exhaling SMOKE from burning substances or agents held by hand.	Smoking Behaviors,Smoking Habit,Behavior, Smoking,Behaviors, Smoking,Habit, Smoking,Habits, Smoking,Smoking Behavior,Smoking Habits
D015982	Bias	Any deviation of results or inferences from the truth, or processes leading to such deviation. Bias can result from several sources: one-sided or systematic variations in measurement from the true value (systematic error); flaws in study design; deviation of inferences, interpretations, or analyses based on flawed data or data collection; etc. There is no sense of prejudice or subjectivity implied in the assessment of bias under these conditions.	Aggregation Bias,Bias, Aggregation,Bias, Ecological,Bias, Statistical,Bias, Systematic,Ecological Bias,Outcome Measurement Errors,Statistical Bias,Systematic Bias,Bias, Epidemiologic,Biases,Biases, Ecological,Biases, Statistical,Ecological Biases,Ecological Fallacies,Ecological Fallacy,Epidemiologic Biases,Experimental Bias,Fallacies, Ecological,Fallacy, Ecological,Scientific Bias,Statistical Biases,Truncation Bias,Truncation Biases,Bias, Experimental,Bias, Scientific,Bias, Truncation,Biase, Epidemiologic,Biases, Epidemiologic,Biases, Truncation,Epidemiologic Biase,Error, Outcome Measurement,Errors, Outcome Measurement,Outcome Measurement Error
D015995	Prevalence	The total number of cases of a given disease in a specified population at a designated time. It is differentiated from INCIDENCE, which refers to the number of new cases in the population at a given time.	Period Prevalence,Point Prevalence,Period Prevalences,Point Prevalences,Prevalence, Period,Prevalence, Point,Prevalences