Cigarette Industry

The authors of the study, published in the June issue of the journal Addiction, said it provides compelling evidence that the tobacco industry has conducted extensive research on the tastes and habits of smoking among women Over the years, and intentionally modified product design to attract female smokers.

"These internal documents reveal that the tobacco industry targets women goes far beyond marketing and advertising," says Carrie Murray Carpenter, MS, and colleagues at the Harvard School of Public Health. The researchers have called for further investigation of the effects of targeting smoking behavior, health outcomes, and regulation of tobacco products by public health agencies.

For their study, researchers conducted a web search of over seven million internal documents of the tobacco industry made public by the Master Settlement Agreement of 1998 struck the state attorneys general and major manufacturers U.S. tobacco. Of these, 320 were deemed relevant and 88 from the date between 1969 and 2000 were cited in the study of addiction.

Sources for these documents included the tobacco industry giants like Philip Morris, RJ Reynolds, Brown & Williamson, Lorillard and.

According to investigators, internal documents revealed that the tobacco industry has sought to identify gender differences in motivational factors, smoking habits, product preferences and in an effort to promote and enhance smoking girls and women. After the product development efforts identified a variety of characteristics of cigarettes to meet the needs and desires of women who smoke.

The resulting product, for example, operated health concepts mistaken about the relative safety of light cigarettes, created false perceptions of health and social effects of profits to reduce secondhand smoke cigarettes , smell and taste better; matched the taste preferences of women flavored, smooth and sweet taste of cigarettes and targeted physiological differences and inhalation with greater ease of draw, increased sensory pleasure and altered tar and nicotine.

Review of industry marketing strategies and internal product, the researchers said, has important implications for prevention efforts and cessation and to develop policies and regulations addressing the health risks linked to smoking Women.
To curb tobacco smoking among females, researchers have called for regulation of packaging and the product with traditional public health interventions, such as price increases, promotion of clean air and education of women about dangers.

In a commentary accompanying the study, Jack Hemmingfield, Ph.D., and colleagues from Johns Hopkins wrote:

"Some of the shots-targeted marketing hardest women with images such as health, slim, beautiful female athletes and the" new choices light cigarette brands rather than quit. "

The Hopkins team has done an "even more pernicious force," namely how the tobacco industry conducted extensive research on smoking habits, needs and preferences on the products of women in the "Guiding they modified the design of cigarettes to promote smoking among women. "

In their commentary, Dr Hemmingfield and colleagues noted that the industry's own studies of gender differences in smoking behavior to note that women use nicotine to reduce stress, negative affect, and weight body.

cigarette designs and ingredients.