Study links childhood trauma and smoking

November 2, 1999
Web posted at: 4:06 p.m. EST (2106 GMT)

(CNN) -- People who have experienced certain negative situations during childhood, from abuse to a parent's divorce, are more likely to smoke, according to a study published in this week's Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

Researchers looked at the relationship between negative childhood experiences and smoking in adolescence and adulthood. The information was compiled from surveys taken by 9,215 adult patients who were members of the Kaiser Permanente health maintenance organization.

"I think even more disturbing than the trends in cigarette smoking, is that two-thirds of the people we studied, and these are people who are relatively well off, had at least one of the adverse childhood experiences that we studied," said Dr. Robert Anda of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in an interview with CNN correspondent Pat Etheridge.

The study, conducted by the CDC, looked at eight childhood traumas including: psychological, physical and sexual abuse, having a battered mother, parents who are separated or divorced, and living with those were substance abusers, mentally ill or had been imprisoned.

Researchers found compared to those who claimed no childhood trauma, people who experienced five or more traumas were 5.4 times more likely to start smoking by the age of 14.

"The percentage of persons who reported feeling depressed or sad much of the time in the past year increased as the number of adverse childhood experiences increased," the authors wrote. "Furthermore, for any given number of adverse childhood experiences, the percentage of respondents reporting problems with depressed affect (depressed mood) was always higher among smokers than among nonsmokers."

Sixty-three percent of respondents reported at least one traumatic childhood experience. The exposure to one adverse childhood experience raised the probability of exposure to any other category of adverse experience, according to researchers.

"I think the central message of this study is number one, that our children are faced with a terrible burden of stressors. And number two, these stressors lead them to smoke," Anda said.

The findings may explain recent reversals in positive trends: fewer adults are now kicking the habit, and more adolescents are lighting up for the first time.

Psychologist Robert Schwebel says young people often take up habits like smoking to meet emotional needs

"So if a child is suffering some sort of pain, or is depressed or feeling bad, tobacco, as it happens, is something that will change their mood temporarily," Schwebel said.

The study was funded by the CDC and the Teachers of Preventive Medicine in Washington, D.C.