Parents

Parents influence the decisions kids make about tobacco. Kids are more likely to start smoking if one or both of their parents are smokers--in fact, high school students who live with one or more smokers are twice as likely to smoke.

If they do start smoking, teenage smokers become addicted to nicotine very quickly. Some children become addicted even just 4 weeks after starting to smoke. And the earlier children begin smoking, the more likely they are to develop a disease related to smoking.

If you are a parent who wants to prevent your child from using tobacco, read the following suggestions.

Parents or guardians can:

• Set a good example by not using tobacco and give clear, consistent messages about the dangers of tobacco to your children.
• Provide your children with a tobacco-free environment at home.
• Learn what new products the tobacco industry is pushing at kids—many do not appear to be tobacco products at first glance.
• Support comprehensive school health programs and insist that they include tobacco-use prevention education.
• Help your children who use tobacco set realistic goals for quitting and give them positive reinforcement and encouragement.
• Help your children who use tobacco identify the underlying reasons for its use and substitute positive activities, such as physical activity or stress management, to compensate.
• Help your children critically analyze messages that glamorize tobacco use on television, in movies, and in magazines and other print media.
• Join a school health committee and guide policies to prevent tobacco use.
• Volunteer to help school staff implement tobacco-use prevention activities.
• Work with the school board to provide assistance programs, rather than punishment, for students who violate tobacco-use policies.
• Share tobacco-use prevention information with your children and talk with them about related homework assignments and projects.