The Cigarette Carrying Habit of Occasional Smokers

Abstract

Background: To examine a behavioral mechanism that might have helped occasional smokers maintain their non-daily consumption pattern: their cigarette-carrying habit. Methods: Current smokers (N=2,732) from the 2008 California Tobacco Survey were grouped into four categories: occasional smokers who had never smoked daily (N=255), occasional smokers who used to smoke daily (N=365), lowrate daily smokers who smoked ≤ 5 cigarettes per day (N=280), and regular daily smokers who smoked > 5 cigarettes per day (N=1,832). Percentages in response to the cigarette-carrying question were weighted to the California population. Results: Most occasional smokers, 78.3% of those who had never smoked daily and 74.1% of those who used to smoke daily, reported not usually carrying cigarettes with them. In contrast, 10.2% of the regular daily smokers reported not carrying their cigarettes. In between were the low-rate daily smokers (38.1%). The pattern of results is consistent across ethnic groups. Conclusions: Cigarette-carrying habit appears to be a major behavioral difference between occasional and regular daily smokers. That most occasional smokers (regardless of whether they used to smoke daily) do not carry their cigarettes suggests the habit of carrying cigarettes and nicotine dependence are correlated, and changing one might lead to change in the other.