Does tobacco marketing undermine the influence of recommended parenting in discouraging adolescents from smoking?
OBJECTIVE: The tobacco industry contends that parenting practices, not marketing practices, are critical to youth smoking. Our objective was to examine whether tobacco-industry marketing practices undermine the protective effect of recommended authoritative parenting against adolescent smoking. DESIGN AND SETTING: Receptivity to tobacco advertising and promotions was assessed in 1996 from a representative sample of California adolescent never-smokers aged 12 to 14 years. A follow-up survey of 1641 of these adolescents was conducted in 1999 that included measures of the key components of authoritative parenting: parental responsiveness, monitoring, and limit setting. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: Smoking initiation in adolescents. RESULTS: Adolescents in families with more-authoritative parents were half as likely to smoke by follow-up as adolescents in families with less-authoritative parents (20% vs 41%, p <0.0001). In families with more-authoritative parents, adolescents who were highly rece
