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Girls, pecking order and smoking

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  • Michell, Lynn
  • Amos, Amanda

Abstract

Against a background of growing concern about the failure to reduce cigarette smoking amongst young people, particularly girls, this paper attempts to unravel the complex interrelationships between smoking, peer group structure and gender. We were particularly intrigued to explore a recent hypothesis in the literature that suggests that girls who smoke, far from lacking self-esteem, are more self-confident and socially skilled than their non-smoking peers. Sociometric and qualitative analyses revealed that smoking behaviour was indeed shaped by gender, and that the psychosocial processes involved in smoking uptake may be different for boys and than for girls. Peer group structure, consistently described by young people as hierarchical, was closely related to smoking behaviour. Girls at the top of the social pecking order who projected an image of high self-esteem were identified as most likely to smoke, while only a small minority of girls fitted the stereotype of the young female smoker who has poor social skills and low self-esteem. Boys of high social status were less vulnerable, since sport and a desire to be fit to some extent protected them. Our findings raise fundamental questions about the meaning of self-esteem in relation to smoking uptake, arguing instead for an exploration of the term "self-worth". They suggest the need for health education programmes which are sensitive both to gender and to peer group structures.

Suggested Citation

  • Michell, Lynn & Amos, Amanda, 1997. "Girls, pecking order and smoking," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 44(12), pages 1861-1869, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:44:y:1997:i:12:p:1861-1869
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    Cited by:

    1. Fujimoto, Kayo & Valente, Thomas W., 2015. "Multiplex congruity: Friendship networks and perceived popularity as correlates of adolescent alcohol use," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 173-181.
    2. Turner, Katrina & West, Patrick & Gordon, Jacki & Young, Robert & Sweeting, Helen, 2006. "Could the peer group explain school differences in pupil smoking rates? An exploratory study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 62(10), pages 2513-2525, May.
    3. Robalino, Juan David, 2016. "Smoking Peer Effects among Adolescents: Are Popular Teens More Influential?," IZA Discussion Papers 9714, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. O’Malley, A. James & Paul, Sudeshna, 2015. "Using retrospective sampling to estimate models of relationship status in large longitudinal social networks," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 35-46.
    5. Sudeshna Paul & A. James O'Malley, 2013. "Hierarchical longitudinal models of relationships in social networks," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 62(5), pages 705-722, November.
    6. West, Patrick & Sweeting, Helen & Young, Robert & Kelly, Shona, 2010. "The relative importance of family socioeconomic status and school-based peer hierarchies for morning cortisol in youth: An exporatory study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(8), pages 1246-1253, April.
    7. Harsh Gupta & Mason A. Porter, 2020. "Mixed Logit Models and Network Formation," Papers 2006.16516, arXiv.org, revised Aug 2022.
    8. Vishesh Karwa & Pavel N. Krivitsky & Aleksandra B. Slavković, 2017. "Sharing social network data: differentially private estimation of exponential family random-graph models," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 66(3), pages 481-500, April.
    9. Ana Balsa & Carlos Díaz, 2018. "Social interactions in health behaviors and conditions," Documentos de Trabajo/Working Papers 1802, Facultad de Ciencias Empresariales y Economia. Universidad de Montevideo..
    10. Fotouhi, Babak & Rytina, Steven, 2018. "Mathematical Modeling and Inference for Degree-capped Ego-centric Network Sampling," SocArXiv 5kez8, Center for Open Science.
    11. Gil, Luciana A. & Kwon, Kyoung-Nan & Good, Linda K. & Johnson, Lester W., 2012. "Impact of self on attitudes toward luxury brands among teens," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 65(10), pages 1425-1433.
    12. Östberg, Viveca & Modin, Bitte, 2008. "Status relations in school and their relevance for health in a life course perspective: Findings from the Aberdeen children of the 1950's cohort study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(4), pages 835-848, February.
    13. Sutherland, Alex, 2012. "Is parental socio-economic status related to the initiation of substance abuse by young people in an English city? An event history analysis," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(7), pages 1053-1061.
    14. Juan David Robalino & Michael Macy, 2018. "Peer effects on adolescent smoking: Are popular teens more influential?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(7), pages 1-12, July.

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    Keywords

    adolescent girls smoking;

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