Influential Components of the Tendency of Adolescents and Young People to Use Hookah: An Application of the Theory of Planned Behavior in Yasuj, Iran

Smoking, especially Hookah, is one of the major behavioral problems in the field of health which has become more widespread among young people and adolescents in recent years. Despite the implementation of various programs to reduce this behavior in Iran, it seems that little attention has been paid to the use of behavioral patterns to design effective interventions in this area. The aim of this study was to determine the effective components of adolescents and young people's tendency to use hookah: an application of the theory of planned behavior in Yasuj.

This study was a cross-sectional study that was implemented in the first months of 2019 to assess the factors affecting the intention to quit Hookah in young people living in Yasuj. 157 people aged 15 to 30 years old hung out at coffee houses and amusement gardens in the tourist area of Yasuj waterfall were selected by available sampling method and a questionnaire measuring the structures of the theory of planned behavior was completed for them. In the present study, descriptive statistics in the form of frequency percentage, mean and standard deviation as well as analytical statistics in the form of multiple linear regression were used. SPSS software version 25 was used for data analysis.

Results

The highest frequency of study participants were men with a mean age of 20± 2 years, higher education, and living in urban areas. In more than 70% of the participants, the history of Hookah use was mentioned among family members (brother and father, respectively, with the highest frequency). More than 96% of the participants had friends who smoked Hookah and their average first age of hookah use was 16.88±2.77 years. More than 63% of the participants mentioned coffee and coffee shops as the usual places for Hookah use. Among the constructs of the theory of planned behavior, the predictive power of the perceived behavioral control construct for the intention to quit Hookah use was higher than other constructs. Based on this finding, an intervention was designed including the production and installation of posters and labels containing the message of reinforcing perceived behavioral control (p< 0.001).

  Due to the small role of patterns and theories of behavioral change in reducing Hookah use in Iran, it seems that interventions based on structures with more predictive power such as perceived behavioral control structures in the present study, can have different effects, comparing to routine schedules.