Socio-demographic factors associated with smoking habits among university students in Belgrade, Serbia

Faculty Group / Sociodemographic characteristics	MF (n=329) 12.6%	TOTAL NMF (n=2,279) 87.4%	SSHF (n=1,225) 47%	NSMF (n=200) 7.7%	TESF (n=854) 32.7%	TOTAL (n=2,608) 100%
Gender (%)
Female	63.5	59.1	68.9	66.0	43.3	59.6
Male	36.5	40.9	31.1	34.0	56.7	40.4
Age (Mean±Sd)	24.3±1.6	23.7±2.7	24.2±2.9	23.3±1.8	23.2±2.5	23.8±2.6
Year of study (%)
I	9.4	22.2	17.4	24.2	28.5	20.5
II	18.9	22.6	16.9	30.4	29.0	22.1
III	52.5	24.5	26.2	21.6	22.8	28.1
IV	14.5	21.0	27.6	20.1	11.9	20.2
V	4.7	9.7	12.0	3.6	7.9	9.1

[i] Average age of the respondents was 23.8±2.6 years. The third year of studying prevailed (28.1% vs. 9.1–22.1%).

[ii] The results of analysed influence of 4 predictors of smoking status are shown in Table 2.

Table 2

Smoking status and sociodemographic characteristics of students.

Predictors	Pearson’s χ²test	P value	Statistically significant influence of predictors on smoking status
Gender	3.9	0.141	-
Age	15.1	0.001	Ex-smokers – ≤25
			Ex-smokers – >25
Faculty group MF, SSHF, NSMF, TESF	14.4	0.025	Smoking status – MF and SSHF
			Smoking status – NSMF and SSHF
MF, NMF	5.4	0.066	-
Year of study	8.2	0.411	-

[i] Age (p=0.001) and faculty group (p=0.025, all four groups analysed) had a statistically significant influence on smoking status.

[ii] There were no statistically significant differences in smoking status between students of MF and NMF (p=0.066). When all four faculty groups were included in the analysis, statistically significant differences in smoking status of students from MF and SSHF were discovered, as well as between those attending NSMF and SSHF.

[iii] An overview of the smoking status of the students by faculty group and gender is presented in Table 3.

Table 3

Smoking status of students by faculty group and by gender.

Faculty Group		Smoking status								P (Gender/Smoking status)
		Non-smokers		Ex-smokers		Smokers		TOTAL
		n	%	n	%	n	%	n	%
MF	Female	149	71.3	6	2.9	54	25.8	209	8.0
	Male	79	65.8	8	6.7	33	27.5	120	4.6	0.224
NMF	Female	842	62.6	73	5.4	431	32.0	1346	51.6	0.244
	Male	591	63.3	64	6.9	278	29.8	933	35.8
SSHF	Female	517	61.3	46	5.5	281	33.3	844	32.4	0.029
	Male	230	60.4	36	9.4	115	30.2	381	14.6
NSMF	Female	90	68.2	4	3.0	38	28.8	132	5.1
	Male	51	75.0	2	2.9	15	22.1	68	2.6	0.587
TESF	Female	235	63.5	23	6.2	112	30.3	370	14.2
	Male	310	64.0	26	5.4	148	30.6	484	18.6	0.871
TOTAL MF		228	69.3	14	4.3	87	26.4	329	12.6	0.066
TOTAL NMF		1433	62.9	137	6.0	709	31.1	2279	87.4
TOTAL FEMALE		991	63.7	79	5.1	485	31.2	1555	59.6	0.141
TOTAL MALE		670	63.6	72	6.8	311	29.5	1053	40.4
TOTAL		1661	63.7	151	5.8	796	30.5	2608	100.0

[i] The prevalence of smokers was lower among medical students than among non-medical ones (MF: 26.4% vs. NMF: 31.1%), but this difference was not statistically significant (p=0.066).

[ii] Although the percentage of smokers was higher among women (31.2% vs. 29.5%), the gender difference in smoking status among students was not statistically significant (p=0.141).

[iii] The analysis of smoking-related experiences and attitudes of students depending on their sociodemographic characteristics, faculty group, and smoking status is depicted in Table 4.

Table 4

Smoking experiences and attitudes of students by sociodemographic characteristics, faculty group and smoking status.

Predictors	Experience / Attitude
	Attendance to tobacco industry sponsored event		Supporting the smoking ban		Compliance with the smoking ban at my faculty		There is a sufficiently broad debate about the harmful effects of smoking at my faculty		Adequate public health training is provided at my faculty
	%	p	%	p	%	p	%	p	%	p
Gender
Female	18.1	0.001	78.8	<0.001	61.7	0.251	11.5	0.377	12.2	0.066
Male	24.1	0.001	72.9	<0.001	60.7	0.251	13.0	0.377	15.2	0.066
Age
≤25	18.6	<0.001	75.4	0.018	60.9	0.091	11.7	0.179	13.3	0.415
>25	30.1	<0.001	81.5	0.018	62.8	0.091	14.2	0.179	13.5	0.415
Faculty group
MF	16.8		83.5		57.2		35.8		41.1
SSHF	22.5	0.256	75.1	0.001	65.2	<0.001	8.2	<0.001	7.5	<0.001
NSMF	19.6	0.256	81.8	0.001	57.7	<0.001	13.6	<0.001	13.6	<0.001
TESF	19.3		74.2		58.1		8.2		11.1
Year of study
I	15.0		70.3		62.1		11.4		14.7
II	18.3		75.0		65.0		9.2		10.5
III	19.0	<0.001	76.7	0.001	53.9	0.005	16.3	<0.001	16.7	<0.001
IV	25.7	<0.001	81.3	0.001	64.8	0.005	11.5	<0.001	11.1	<0.001
V	28.9		84.2		63.2		10.5		10.7
Smoking status
Non-smokers	18.2		83.4		60.7		11.6		14.1
Ex-smokers	28.7	0.002	75.8	<0.001	59.7	0.011	8.7	0.002	11.6	0.061
Smokers	23.7	0.002	62.1	<0.001	62.8	0.011	13.9	0.002	12.4	0.061
Total	20.5		76.4		61.3		12.1		13.4

Table 5

Smoking behaviours and motives of students who smoked per faculty group.

Smoking behaviours and motives	FACULTY GROUP (%)						P (Behaviours & motives / Faculty group)
	MF	TOTAL NMF	SSHF	NSMF	TESF	TOTAL
Smoking onset
In elementary school	9.0	8.7	8.1	15.2	8.3	8.7	0.555
In high school	62.8	66.6	66.9	54.3	68.5	66.2
At faculty	28.2	24.7	24.9	30.4	23.2	25.1
Length of smoking
Less than a year	10.3	13.4	11.5	28.3	13.5	13.1	0.068
1–5 years	71.8	67.1	67.5	58.7	68.0	67.6
Over 5 years	17.9	19.5	21.0	13.0	18.4	19.3
Presence of smokers in the family
No	34.6	29.8	28.2	18.2	34.6	30.4	0.084
Yes	65.4	70.2	71.8	81.8	65.4	69.6
One smoker	23.1	27.6	29.5	25.0	25.1	27.1	0.088
Two smokers	20.5	28.5	29.0	34.1	26.7	27.6
Three smokers	7.7	7.3	7.8	13.6	5.3	7.3
More than three smokers	14.1	6.8	5.6	9.1	8.2	7.6
Reasons for starting smoking
Stress	15.5	15.7	16.1	18.8	15.2	15.9	0.111
Peer influence	37.9	36.3	37.8	34.4	34.3	36.5
Pleasure and party	15.5	14.7	16.8	3.1	13.5	14.8
Personal attitude/choice	31.0	27.2	24.5	43.8	28.1	27.4
I do not know/remember	0.0	6.0	4.9	0.0	9.0	5.4
Attempted to quit smoking
Yes	52.6	43.3	44.1	34.9	43.6	44.3	0.289
No	47.4	56.7	55.9	65.1	56.4	55.7

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/sjph-2019-0002 | Journal eISSN: 1854-2476 | Journal ISSN: 0351-0026

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Language: English, Slovenian

Page range: 11 - 20

Submitted on: Apr 26, 2018

Accepted on: Nov 26, 2018

Published on: Jan 21, 2019

Published by: National Institute of Public Health, Slovenia

In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services

Keywords:

smoking,

Related subjects:

Hygiene and environmental medicine

© 2019 Andrijana Milošević Georgiev, Jelena Kotur-Stevuljević, Dušanka Krajnović, published by National Institute of Public Health, Slovenia
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Volume 58 (2019): Issue 1 (March 2019)