Socioeconomic differences in adolescents' smoking: a comparison between Finland and Beijing, China.

Yang Liu,Yan Lv,Jari Villberg,Lasse Kannas,Mei Wang,Jorma Tynjälä

doi:10.1186/s12889-016-3476-0

Abstract

BackgroundVarious studies have demonstrated the associations between socioeconomic status (SES) and health and health behaviour among adolescents. However, few studies have compared the socioeconomic difference in adolescent smoking between countries with different stage of smoking. The purpose of this study was to examine and compare the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and adolescent smoking in Beijing, China and Finland through the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study.MethodsThe data used in this study were derived from the Chinese HBSC linked project survey 2008 in Beijing and the Finnish HBSC survey 2006. The final sample included 2005 Chinese and 1685 Finnish 15-year-old schoolchildren. The associations between Family Affluence Scale (FAS), as the SES measure, and adolescents’ smoking behaviour, including ever smoked, weekly smoking and the early onset of smoking were examined separately in two countries through binary logistic regression.ResultsCompared to students from the high FAS group, Chinese boys from the low FAS group were more likely to report having ever smoked (OR = 2.12, 95 % CI = 1.49–3.01) and being early onset of smoking (OR = 2.17, 95 % CI = 1.44–3.26). Finnish girls from the low FAS group were more likely to report being weekly smokers (OR = 1.68, 95 % CI = 1.07–2.65). No significant difference was found for Chinese girls and Finnish boys.ConclusionsThis study indicated different patterns of socioeconomic difference in smoking between Chinese and Finnish adolescents by gender and by smoking behaviour, which suggests that socioeconomic inequalities in smoking are different among adolescents in countries with different stage of smoking. Country specific policies and interventions for different target groups should be encouraged and designed for reducing the prevalence of adolescents’ smoking.

Highlights

Various studies have demonstrated the associations between socioeconomic status (SES) and health and health behaviour among adolescents
In Western countries, numerous studies regarding socioeconomic inequalities and smoking have been done in adult populations and the results indicate that people from lower socioeconomic status (SES) groups, defined by income, education, occupation or other SES measures, are more likely to smoke [10,11,12,13]
When the smoking behaviour of students from the high Family Affluence Scale (FAS) group were used as a reference group, we found that Chinese boys from the low FAS group were more likely to report having ever smoked (OR = 2.12, 95 % Confidence Interval (CI): 1.49–3.01), and being early onset of smoking (OR = 2.17, 95 % CI: 1.44–3.26) than those from the high affluence families

Summary

Introduction

Various studies have demonstrated the associations between socioeconomic status (SES) and health and health behaviour among adolescents. According to the Adolescent Health and Lifestyle Survey (AHLS), experiencing smoking and daily smoking have decreased among Finnish adolescents during the study period 1977–2011 in all age groups and both genders [4] and the decreasing trend continued over the past 2 years [5]. These facts demonstrated that at present, Finland has reached the final stage at which the overall prevalence of smoking is decreasing

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