In order to understand and document the patterns of smoking among youth, the use of reliable and valid measures is essential. The current analysis uses data on 63 ever smokers (mean age 14.1 years) from the first three years of follow-up of the McGill University Study on the Natural History of Nicotine Dependence In Teens. To examine reliability, we compared responses to one-month recall to three-month recall of the subjects' smoking history. The questionnaire demonstrated very good reliability for smoking intensity (kappa = 0.75) and smoking frequency (kappa = 0.78). Number of cigarettes smoked per month showed good reliability (ICC = 0.64). Reliability remained acceptable when subjects who reported no cigarette consumption at both questionnaire administrations were excluded (kappa = 0.66; kappa = 0.70; ICC = 0.61, respectively). Older adolescents (14--16) were better at recalling their smoking history than younger adolescents (12--13). Female sex and smoking status (sporadic versus regular) were associated with adequate recall for one and two of the indicators investigated, respectively.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.80258 |
| Date | January 2003 |
| Creators | Eppel, Ayelet S. M. |
| Contributors | O'Loughlin, Jennifer (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 002031420, proquestno: AAIMQ98627, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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