Abstract
Aim
To investigate cigarette consumption patterns exhibited by non-smokers, occasional smokers, and daily smokers in Malaysia.
Subjects and methods
A sample of 4204 individuals from the 2011 Malaysian Global Adult Tobacco Survey is analyzed. A zero-inflated ordered probit model is used to accommodate the ordinal nature of smoking outcomes with excessive zero observations of non-smokers.
Results
Socio-demographic characteristics are closely associated with consumption patterns of non-smokers, occasional smokers, and daily smokers. Specifically, urbanites, government employees, and Malays exhibit greater tendencies to be daily smokers and lower propensities to be non-smokers than others. Education is a deterring factor in cigarette smoking as higher education up to the tertiary level raises the propensity of being a non-smoker by 8.16 percentage points. The role of ethnicity is highlighted as individuals of Malay and other ethnic backgrounds are more likely to smoke daily, while exhibiting lower propensities of being non-smokers. Males are more likely to engage in occasional or daily smoking than females. Employment in government or non-government sectors increases the probability of daily smoking.
Conclusions
Our results suggest the need to include measures to cope with internal or external cues among smokers with specific socio-demographic characteristics. Cessation interventions should focus on daily smokers in urban surroundings with low education levels and those of Malay ethnic origins. Anti-smoking measures in line with occasional smoking may include ameliorating the male attitude toward smoking and policies to prohibit workplace indulgence.
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Notes
As of May 2016, the exchange rate was approximately US$1.00 = RM4.02 or RM1.00 = US$0.25.
While there were choices for “do not know,” “refused to answer,” and “missing/not applicable,” no responses were noted.
Another set of media information, availability of television and radio in the household, was considered but found to be statistically insignificant.
Smith (2003) investigated such dependency from a theoretical perspective and found that such dependent models contain too little statistical information to support estimation of error dependence, even when dependency is truly present. He noted the lack of support for the dependency in a majority of empirical studies, called for the elimination of attempts to estimate dependency using such framework, and advocated the advantage of the independent specification in permitting more flexible modeling.
Parameter estimates for both the independent ZI ordered probit and ordered probit models are available upon request.
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Acknowledgments
Research support from the Universiti Sains Malaysia Research University grant (grant no. 1001/PSOSIAL/816238) is acknowledged.
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Tan, A.K.G., Yen, S.T. Cigarette consumption by individuals in Malaysia: a zero-inflated ordered probability approach. J Public Health 25, 87–94 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-016-0754-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-016-0754-3