Effect of Educational Intervention Based on Theory of Planned Behavior on the Reduction of Water Pipe Smoking in Women

In modern communities, smoking is one of the most important causes of illness, disability, and premature death. It is regarded as a pervasive health problem in the world. The risk of death in the tobacco consumers is 80-90 percent higher than ordinary people. In this regard, this study aimed to investigate the variables of behavioral intention and subjective norms in reducing the smoking water pipe in intervention and control groups after an educational intervention in women over 15 years in Bandar Abbas in 2015.

 In this quasi-experimental study, 128 women over 15 years who had at least one waterpipe smoking a day were selected by the multi-stage cluster. They were classified into two groups of intervention and control groups. Data were collected using a validated and reliable questionnaire based on the Theory of Planned Behavior constructs and demographic information before and after the intervention. Collected data were assessed using an independent paired t-test, t-test, and chi-square test. In all tests, the significance level was set to 0.05.

The results showed that there is a significant difference in mean score between behavioral intention and subjective norms in two groups after the intervention (P<0.05). In addition, compared to the control group, the frequency of waterpipe smoking among women in the intervention group significantly decreased after the intervention (P<0.05).

The results showed that behavioral intention and subjective norms based on constructs of Theory of Planned Behavior might be effective strategies to reduce tobacco use in women.