The Family Effects of Cigarettes
Smoking Behaviour and Family Smoking Facts

The effects of cigarettes and smoking behaviour within the family are well established.

The smoking facts show that parental attitudes and behaviour are a significant influence on all children. Additionally the environmental tobacco smoke you produce subjects children to all the known harmful effects of smoking.

But the true and significant effects of smoking cigarettes ultimately occurs through your example. You are a role model to your children.

- Family and Social Effects of Cigarettes -
Smoking Behaviour as an Example to Children

What you do and what you think has a profound effect on your children.

The facts about smoking in the family show that children who grow up in a home with environmental tobacco smoke are not only more likely to smoke but more likely to experience adverse health effects of smoking cigarettes as if they were smokers themselves.

- Family Smoking Facts -
Environmental Tobacco Smoke

• Babies are particularly sensitive to the effects of cigarettes. Smoking parents create a risk for respiratory health problems in their children. That risk is clearly established, and the risk is greatest if the exposure to tobacco smoke occurs during the prenatal period and the first few years of life.


• Parents who smoke are more likely to have a baby that dies from sudden infant death syndrome than parents who have never smoked.


• both prenatal maternal smoking and exposure to environmental tobacco smoke are linked to ear infections, behavioral problems, and learning disabilities.


• Parental smoking increases both the prevalence and severity of
asthma in children.

It is generally assumed that people start smoking because they do not know any better. The smoking facts tell a different story.

The factors that determine why people smoke are largely social and emotional. The influence of friends, family, and other important role models influence the decision about whether to experiment with cigarette smoking.

- Family Effects of Cigarettes -
Smoking Behaviour and Family Smoking Facts

There is no question that many children learn how to be smokers from their family. Children are more likely to be smokers as adults, if smoking is normalized in family and social circles.

If smoking cigarettes is an accepted behaviour that appears to bring people closer or create social ties and family bonding, the risk for taking up smoking increases.

Normalizing smoking behaviour in the family is strongly influenced by the attitude and actions of parents.

• if smoking is allowed within the family home, a child is more likely to become a smoker.


• the greater the number of people in the home who smoke, the more likely a child is to become a smoker.


• permissive attitudes on the part of the parent create higher smoking risks. Parents who do not approve of smoking and make it known, are less likely to raise children who smoke.

The effects of cigarettes in the family and in society have a significant impact on children.

Although as children the intention to smoke may not be present, when children reach the preteen and teen years they may start experimenting with how to be a grown up, and then start to emulate the behaviours they see around them.

When parents and loved ones use cigarettes children come to see them as a normal part of life. When children can see cigarettes for sale in stores, or view print media such as magazines or billboards with cigarettes viewed in a positive way, they come to accept them as a normal and desirable part of life.

What will the effects of cigarettes and smoking behaviour in your family be?

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