The role of social support and social networks in smoking behavior among middle and older aged people in rural areas of South Korea: A cross-sectional study

BMC Public Health

Research Article

Yoon Hwa Kang¹  Jung Min Son²  Min Kyung Lim³  Jin-Kyoung Oh³  E Hwa Yun³ 

[1] Department of Public Health Service, District Health Care Team, Korean Health Industry Development Institute, Daesung Building, 311-27, Noryangjin-dong, 156-050, Dongjak-Gu, Seoul, South Korea;Department of Social Welfare, Dongguk University, 26, Pil-dong 3-ga, 100-715, Jung-gu, Seoul, South Korea;National Cancer Control Institute, Korea National Cancer Center, 323 Ilsan-ro, Ilsandong-gu, 410-769, Goyang-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea;

关键词: Social Support;    Social Network;    Smoking Status;    Smoking Behavior;    Smoking Prevalence;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2458-10-78

 received in 2009-09-11, accepted in 2010-02-18,  发布年份 2010

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundAlthough the number of studies on anti-smoking interventions has increased, studies focused on identifying social contextual factors in rural areas are scarce. The purpose of this study was to explore the role of social support and social networks in smoking behavior among middle and older aged people living in rural areas of South Korea.MethodsThe study employed a cross-sectional design. Participants included 1,057 adults, with a mean age of 60.7 years, residing in rural areas. Information on participants' tobacco use, stress, social support, and social networks was collected using structured questionnaires. The chi-square test, the t-test, ANOVA, and logistic regression were used for data analysis.ResultsThe overall smoking prevalence in the study was 17.4% (men, 38.8%; women, 5.1%). Overall, stress was high among women, and social support was high among men. Smokers had high levels of social support (t = -2.90, p = .0038) and social networks (t = -2.22, p = .0271), as compared to non- and former smokers. Those in the high social support group were likely to be smokers (AOR = 2.21, 95% CI 1.15-4.26). Women with moderate social ties were less likely to smoke (AOR = 0.18, 95% CI 0.05-0.61).ConclusionThere was a protective role of a moderate social network level among women, and a high level of social support was associated with smoking behaviors in rural areas. Findings suggest the need for a comprehensive understanding of the functions and characteristics of social contextual factors including social support and social networks in order to conduct more effective anti-smoking interventions in rural areas.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Yun et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.