IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/wsu/wpaper/rosenman-15.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Bias in Measuring Smoking Behavior

Author

Listed:
  • Vidhura Tennekoon
  • Robert Rosenman

    (School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University)

Abstract

Researchers often use the discrepancy between the self-reported and biochemically assessed active smoking status to argue that self-reported smoking status is not reliable, ignoring the limitations of biochemically assessed measures and treating it as the gold standard in their comparisons. Here, we employ recent advances in econometric techniques to compare self-reported and biochemically assessed smoking data taking into account errors with both methods. Our results suggest that biochemical measures may not always be more reliable than self-reported data.

Suggested Citation

  • Vidhura Tennekoon & Robert Rosenman, 2013. "Bias in Measuring Smoking Behavior," Working Papers 2013-10, School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University.
    • Handle: RePEc:wsu:wpaper:rosenman-15
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://faculty.ses.wsu.edu/WorkingPapers/rosenman/WP2013-10.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2013
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. van Ours, Jan C., 2002. "A pint a day raises a man's pay; but smoking blows that gain away," IZA Discussion Papers 473, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Vidhura Tennekoon & Robert Rosenman, 2016. "Systematically misclassified binary dependent variables," Communications in Statistics - Theory and Methods, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(9), pages 2538-2555, May.
    3. Hausman, J. A. & Abrevaya, Jason & Scott-Morton, F. M., 1998. "Misclassification of the dependent variable in a discrete-response setting," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 239-269, September.
    4. Who, 2011. "WHO Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic 2011: Warning about the dangers of tobacco," University of California at San Francisco, Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education qt5np8p434, Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, UC San Francisco.
    5. Cowan, Benjamin & Schwab, Benjamin, 2011. "The incidence of the healthcare costs of smoking," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 1094-1102.
    6. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
    7. van Ours, Jan C., 2004. "A pint a day raises a man's pay; but smoking blows that gain away," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(5), pages 863-886, September.
    8. Irina B. Grafova & Frank P. Stafford, 2009. "The Wage Effects of Personal Smoking History," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 62(3), pages 381-393, April.
    9. Phillip B. Levine & Tara A. Gustafson & Ann D. Velenchik, 1997. "More Bad News for Smokers? The Effects of Cigarette Smoking on Wages," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 50(3), pages 493-509, April.
    10. M. Christopher Auld, 2005. "Smoking, Drinking, and Income," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 40(2).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Blog mentions

    As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
    1. #HEJC papers for October 2013
      by academichealtheconomists in The Academic Health Economists' Blog on 2013-10-01 04:30:26
    2. Can we measure smoking behavior?
      by Economic Logician in Economic Logic on 2013-10-08 18:54:00

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Matthew Birch & Robert Rosenman, 2019. "How Much Does Merit Aid Actually Matter? Revisiting Merit Aid and College Enrollment When Some Students “Come Anyway”," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 60(6), pages 760-802, September.
    2. Sean Murphy & Daniel Friesner & Robert Rosenman, 2015. "Opioid Misuse Among Adolescents: New Evidence from a Misclassification Analysis," Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 181-192, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lång, Elisabeth & Nystedt, Paul, 2018. "Blowing up money? The earnings penalty of smoking in the 1970s and the 21st century," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 39-52.
    2. Haque, Samiul & Abedin, Naveen & Fakir, Adnan M. S. & Hannan, Rafe & Alam, Rafa, 2019. "Effects of smoking on agricultural productivity," 2019 Annual Meeting, July 21-23, Atlanta, Georgia 291149, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    3. Bhai Moiz, 2020. "The Earning Losses of Smokers," IZA Journal of Labor Economics, Sciendo & Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 9(1), pages 1-21, March.
    4. Lennon, Conor, 2021. "Are the costs of employer-sponsored health insurance passed on to workers at the individual level?," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 41(C).
    5. Ermakov, Stepan, 2012. "The impact of smoking intensity on wages in Russia," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 25(1), pages 70-94.
    6. Demirgüç-Kunt, Asli & Torre, Iván, 2022. "Measuring human capital in middle income countries," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(4), pages 1036-1067.
    7. Palali, Ali, 2015. "Early Smoking, Education, and Labor Market Performance," Discussion Paper 2015-033, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    8. Cowan, Benjamin & Schwab, Benjamin, 2011. "The incidence of the healthcare costs of smoking," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 1094-1102.
    9. Palali, Ali, 2015. "Early Smoking, Education, and Labor Market Performance," Other publications TiSEM b51be057-cb0e-445a-a428-4, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    10. Pierre Pestieau & Gregory Ponthiere, 2012. "Myopia, regrets, and risky behaviors," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(2), pages 288-317, April.
    11. Anger, Silke & Kvasnicka, Michael, 2006. "Biases in estimates of the smoking wage penalty," SFB 649 Discussion Papers 2006-089, Humboldt University Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 649: Economic Risk.
    12. Cowan, Benjamin W., 2011. "Forward-thinking teens: The effects of college costs on adolescent risky behavior," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 813-825, October.
    13. Eric A. BONDZIE, 2016. "Effect of Smoking and other Economic Variables on Wages in the Euro Area," Journal of Economics Bibliography, KSP Journals, vol. 3(1), pages 38-52, March.
    14. Marcela V. Parada‐Contzen, 2019. "The Value of a Statistical Life for Risk‐Averse and Risk‐Seeking Individuals," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 39(11), pages 2369-2390, November.
    15. Maryam Dilmaghani, 2022. "The link between smoking, drinking and wages: Health, workplace social capital or discrimination?," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(2), pages 160-183, March.
    16. Bengtsson, Tommy & Nilsson, Anton, 2016. "Smoking Behaviour and Early Retirement Due to Chronic Disability," IZA Discussion Papers 9881, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Anger, Silke & Kvasnicka, Michael, 2010. "Does Smoking Really Harm Your Earnings so Much? Biases in Current Estimates of the Smoking Wage Penalty," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 17(6), pages 561-564.
    18. repec:fip:a00001:89435 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Darden, Michael E. & Hotchkiss, Julie L. & Melinda Pitts, M., 2021. "The dynamics of the smoking wage penalty," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    20. F. Brune, Lasse, 2007. "The smoker’s wage penalty puzzle: evidence from Britain," ISER Working Paper Series 2007-31, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    21. repec:hum:wpaper:sfb649dp2006-089 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Bengtsson, Tommy & Nilsson, Anton, 2018. "Smoking and early retirement due to chronic disability," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 31-41.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    smoking prevalence; misclassification; social desirability; biochemical assessments;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C13 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Estimation: General
    • C18 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Methodolical Issues: General
    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • I13 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Insurance, Public and Private
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wsu:wpaper:rosenman-15. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Danielle Engelhardt (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecwsuus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.