For example, quitlines are a major public health strategy for delivering selleck chemical cessation services. They aim to capture smokers who are motivated to quit smoking. However, the perception of risk among light and intermittent smokers may differ from that among heavier smokers, and this perception may affect their motivation to call a quitline. Many other recommendations for future research are included in a separate report that researchers are encouraged to review, discuss, and implement (USDHHS, 2008). Conclusions This special issue of Nicotine & Tobacco Research on light and intermittent smoking creates optimism for a path that is groundbreaking, exciting, and meaningful. If our aim is to reduce the toll of tobacco among populations and to ensure the right of health to all, it is both responsible and ethical science to plan research agendas that aim to reduce light and intermittent smoking.
The projections suggest an impending global pandemic of light and intermittent smoking, and it is important for researchers to monitor this as well as tackle it without delay. The road less traveled��entering a new era of research in which the full spectrum of smokers will be examined��will make the difference. Tobacco threatens the lives of 1 billion people in the 21st century, and multiple research efforts are needed to curb this pandemic. The road less traveled will move the field in a direction in which we are well prepared through global partnerships, discussions, and special initiatives to deal with the tobacco pandemic.
An important factor that contributes to relapse in smokers is how current and former smokers respond to smoking-related cues. Besides direct personal experience, mass media constitutes a major source of smoking-related cues. Examples of such media include magazine advertisements for cigarettes and celebrity smoking in movies. Antismoking advertisements represent another venue for smoking-related cues, although they use smoking cues to illustrate the negative consequences of smoking as part of the antismoking arguments. Based on our preliminary review of 99 antismoking advertisements that lasted 30 s each, targeted adult smokers, and were focused on cessation and treatment seeking, more than one-third of the advertisements contained smoking cues. However, to the best of our knowledge, no cue�Creactivity studies have examined antismoking advertisements.
Our first goal was to test the hypothesis that smoking cues presented in the context of antismoking advertisements elicit smoking urges. If this is the case, smoking urges could counter the persuasive intent of the advertisements and undermine their effectiveness. Our second goal was to examine the role of the advertisements�� GSK-3 argument strength. By ��argument�� we mean the implicit and explicit reasons given in the advertisement for not smoking cigarettes or using tobacco.