Learning Objectives: List the key features of multi-level approaches to understanding the etiological pathways in the acquisition of different levels of tobacco use.
Abstract: Researchers have examined numerous predictors of different levels adolescent smoking, ranging from individual differences in personality and temperament to contextual characteristics of schools, neighborhoods, and communities. Despite a growing recognition of the ways in which these multiple levels influence the likelihood of behavior, few have incorporated such an interdisciplinary approach to account for the interrelations among different levels of explanation. This study uses hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) to address how school context influences the acquisition of different levels of use; and how these relations are modified by gender and parental smoking status. Survey data were collected from two waves of 25,186 middle and high school students attending 38 public schools in Kentucky. Results show that students with higher levels of impulsivity were more likely to transition from abstinence to initiation of experimental use in schools with higher numbers of daily smokers than students with similar personality traits attending schools with less opportunity to use. Moreover, additional tests of moderation indicated that parental smoking magnified this effect and that these relations were consistent for both adolescent males and females. These findings support a social contagion model of substance use and outline the mechanisms in which individual characteristics may either insulate or heighten the risk of exposure to high-risk social environments. This presentation is of use to both researchers and health educators by describing how at-risk adolescents are differentially sensitive to various school environments. Moreover, the presentation will conclude with a discussion of how parental and peer smoking may attenuate the efficacy of school-based prevention programming.
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