The Liverpool Schoolchildren's Longitudinal Study on Smoking

Background

In 1994, The Foundation funded a research project, based at LJMU (Liverpool John Moores University), to assess the perceptions that local primary schoolchildren have about smoking. Understanding where children are in their thinking about tobacco is one of the most fundamental tenets of health education practice and necessary for the development of effective health promotion initiatives. However, little data of this nature is available in the literature.

Initially, the study was funded for two years. Further funding was granted in 1996 and again in 1998. The continued funding enabled the research team to design a unique longitudinal study, following one birth cohort from Reception to Year 6. An innovative 'person-centred' data collection strategy is being used. This mixed method approach (using qualitative and quantitative tools in triangulation) has meant that a range of variables could be explored, from smoking behaviour, intentions, knowledge, beliefs and attitudes, to global self-worth and self-concept in the context of health, gender issues and socio-cultural influences.

Outcomes

The findings have been used to create a large database, which can track individuals as well as year groups. It can map developmental progress and can provide a retrospective review of how local schoolchildren conceptualise tobacco and how this concept develops and changes over time. The research has been published, presented at European and International conferences and will be used to facilitate the development of a school based smoking intervention with TACADE. It has also had the unintended benefits of raising awareness of tobacco in schools and the local community and so generated publicity for the Foundation.

Continuation of the Study

There is significant value in continuing to track the children to the end of compulsory schooling (2006), when they will be 16 years of age. The transition to secondary school is a critical period when many young people experiment with cigarettes. Such significant changes in health beliefs and behaviour need to be examined.

The development of a 12 year data set is unique to the UK. This database has the potential to inform the timing, content, delivery, context and conceptual framework of any future interventions. For example, if the children who start smoking are the same children who once expressed positive beliefs about smoking or intention to smoke, this would suggest the need to target smoking prevention programmes specifically for this high risk group. It would also be possible to create an 'indicators of risk' profile, which could potentially predict which children are most likely to become future smokers. Furthermore, because the data has been gathered qualitatively, directly from the children themselves, any intervention strategies developed are more likely to be culturally appropriate, sustainable and successful. Such a resource is invaluable to building up an understanding of the key factors involved in the process of becoming a smoker and subsequently, to the development of effective smoking prevention strategies.