Young people, gender and smoking in the United Kingdom

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Abstract
Over the last decade, gender has emerged as a significant differentiator of smoking prevalence among young people in developed countries. Some attention has also been given to gender difference.s in motives for taking up smoking. Compared to recent work on adult smoking, the literature on smoking among young people has failed to take up the challenge of the analysis of gender differences to highlight an interpretation of young people's smoking as a rational response to material and social pressures. This paper draws mainly on questionnaire data from an ongoing UK study of Adolescent Health and Parenting to outline an alternative to the usual health education approach to young people's smoking. in this alternative model, the main factors associated with young people's smoking are material circumstances, life satisfaction and stress, including dissatisfaction with parental relationships, and peer sociability. Smoking is associated with poor reported health status. The relationship between social factors and smoking in young men and women shows some significant differences, with young women being significantly more likely to smoke for stress-related reasons. Qualitative materialfrom a follow-up interview study is indicative of the processes underlying the statistical associations found in the questionnaire

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