Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Educational inequalities in smoking over the life cycle: an analysis by cohort and gender

  • Original Article
  • Published:
International Journal of Public Health

Abstract

Objectives

The study investigates the life cycle patterns of educational inequalities in smoking according to gender over three successive generations.

Methods

Based on retrospective smoking histories collected by the nationwide French Health Barometer survey 2010, we explored educational inequalities in smoking at each age, using the relative index of inequality.

Results

Educational inequalities in smoking increase across cohorts for men and women, corresponding to a decline in smoking among the highly educated alongside progression among the lower educated. The analysis also shows a life cycle evolution: for all cohorts and for men and women, inequalities are considerable during adolescence, then start declining from 18 years until the age of peak prevalence (around 25), after which they remain stable throughout the life cycle, even tending to rise for the most recent cohort.

Conclusions

This analysis contributes to the description of the “smoking epidemic” and highlights adolescence and late adulthood as life cycle stages with greater inequalities.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Balia S, Jones AM (2008) Mortality, lifestyle and socio-economic status. J Health Econ 27:1–26

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Balia S, Jones AM (2011) Catching the habit: a study of inequality of opportunity in smoking-related mortality. J R Stat Soc Ser A (Stat Soc) 174:175–194

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beck F, Gautier A, Guignard R, Richard JB (2011) Une méthode de prise en compte du dégroupage total dans le plan de sondage des enquêtes téléphoniques auprès des ménages. In: Tremblay ME, Lavallée P, El Hadj Tirari M (eds) Pratiques et Méthodes de sondage (Collection Sciences Sup), Dunod, Paris pp 310–314

  • Bricard D, Jusot F (2012) Milieu d’origine, situation sociale et parcours tabagique en France. Économie publique/public economics 28-29:169-195

    Google Scholar 

  • Caraballo RS, Kruger J, Asman K et al (2014) Relapse among cigarette smokers: the CARDIA longitudinal study-1985–2011. Addict Behav 39:101–106

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Christopoulou R, Han J, Jaber A, Lillard DR (2011) Dying for a smoke: how much does differential mortality of smokers affect estimated life-course smoking prevalence? Prev Med 52:66–70

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Cutler DM, Lange F, Meara E et al (2011) Rising educational gradients in mortality: the role of behavioral risk factors. J Health Econ 30:1174–1187

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Cutler DM, Lleras-Muney A (2010) Understanding differences in health behaviors by education. J Health Econ 29:1–28

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Etilé F (2007) Modes de vie et santé des jeunes. In: Cohen D (ed) Une jeunesse difficile. Portrait économique et social de la jeunesse française, Éditions Rued’Ulm/Presses de l’École Normale Supérieure, Paris

  • Federico B, Costa G, Kunst AE (2007) Educational inequalities in initiation, cessation, and prevalence of smoking among 3 Italian birth cohorts. Am J Public Health 97:838–845

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Fernandez E, Garcia M, Schiaffino A et al (2001) Smoking initiation and cessation by gender and educational level in Catalonia, Spain. Prev Med 32:218–223

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Gilman SE, Abrams DB, Buka SL (2003) Socioeconomic status over the life course and stages of cigarette use: initiation, regular use, and cessation. J Epidemiol Community Health 57:802–808

    Article  PubMed  CAS  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Graham H, Inskip HM, Francis B, Harman J (2006) Pathways of disadvantage and smoking careers: evidence and policy implications. Journal of epidemiology and community health 60:ii7–ii12

    Article  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Graham H, Hawkins SS, Law C (2010) Lifecourse influences on women’s smoking before, during and after pregnancy. Soc Sci Med 70:582–587

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hayes LJ, Berry G (2002) Sampling variability of the Kunst–Mackenbach relative index of inequality. J Epidemiol Community Health 56:762–765

    Article  PubMed  CAS  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Jefferis BJ, Power C, Graham H, Manor O (2004) Changing social gradients in cigarette smoking and cessation over two decades of adult follow-up in a British birth cohort. J Public Health 26:13–18

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kenkel DS, Lillard DR, Mathios AD (2004) Accounting for misclassification error in retrospective smoking data. Health Econ 13:1031–1044

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Khaw K-T, Wareham N, Bingham S et al (2008) Combined impact of health behaviours and mortality in men and women: the EPIC-Norfolk prospective population study. PLoS Med 5:e12

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Kotz D, West R (2009) Explaining the social gradient in smoking cessation: it’s not in the trying, but in the succeeding. Tob Control 18:43–46

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Legleye S, Janssen E, Beck F et al (2011a) Social gradient in initiation and transition to daily use of tobacco and cannabis during adolescence: a retrospective cohort study. Addiction 106:1520–1531

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Legleye S, Khlat M, Beck F, Peretti-Watel P (2011b) Widening inequalities in smoking initiation and cessation patterns: a cohort and gender analysis in France. Drug Alcohol Depend 117:233–241

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lelong N, Blondel B, Kaminski M (2011) Evolution de la consommation de tabac des femmes pendant la grossesse en France de 1972 à 2003. J Gynécol Obstét Biol Reprod 40:42–49

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Lermenier-Jeannet A (2014) Tobacco in France: overview of 2004–2014. Tendances 92:6p

    Google Scholar 

  • Lopez AD, Collishaw NE, Piha T (1994) A descriptive model of the cigarette epidemic in developed countries. Tob Control 3:242

    Article  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Mackenbach JP, Kunst AE (1997) Measuring the magnitude of socio-economic inequalities in health: an overview of available measures illustrated with two examples from Europe. Soc Sci Med 44:757–771

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Mackenbach JP, Stirbu I, Roskam A-JR et al (2008) Socioeconomic inequalities in health in 22 European countries. N Engl J Med 358:2468–2481

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Mackenbach JP (2011) What would happen to health inequalities if smoking were eliminated? Br Med J 342:1–2

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Maralani V (2013) Educational inequalities in smoking: the role of initiation versus quitting. Soc Sci Med 84:129–137

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • McNeill A, Guignard R, Beck F et al (2015) Understanding increases in smoking prevalence: case study from France in comparison with England 2000-10. Addiction 110(3):392–400

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Oesterle S, Hawkins JD, Hill KG (2011) Men’s and women’s pathways to adulthood and associated substance misuse. J Stud Alcohol Drugs 72:763

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Pampel FC (2005) Diffusion, cohort change, and social patterns of smoking. Soc Sci Res 34:117–139

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Pampel FC, Krueger PM, Denney JT (2010) Socioeconomic disparities in health behaviors. Ann Rev Sociol 36:349

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pampel FC, Mollborn S, Lawrence EM (2014) Life course transitions in early adulthood and SES disparities in tobacco use. Soc Sci Res 43:45–59

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Peretti-Watel P, Seror V, Constance J, Beck F (2009a) Poverty as a smoking trap. Int J Drug Policy 20:230–236

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Peretti-Watel P, Constance J, Seror V, Beck F (2009b) Cigarettes and social differentiation in France: is tobacco use increasingly concentrated among the poor? Addiction 104:1718–1728

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Schiaffino A, Fernandez E, Borrell C et al (2003) Gender and educational differences in smoking initiation rates in Spain from 1948 to 1992. Eur J Public Health 13:56–60

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Schulze A, Mons U (2006) The evolution of educational inequalities in smoking: a changing relationship and a cross-over effect among German birth cohorts of 1921–70. Addiction 101:1051–1056

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Staff J, Schulenberg JE, Maslowsky J et al (2010) Substance use changes and social role transitions: proximal developmental effects on ongoing trajectories from late adolescence through early adulthood. Dev Psychopathol 22:917–932

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Stringhini S, Sabia S, Shipley M et al (2010) Association of socioeconomic position with health behaviors and mortality. JAMA 303:1159–1166

    Article  PubMed  CAS  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Tubeuf S, Jusot F, Bricard D (2012) Mediating role of education and lifestyles in the relationship between early-life conditions and health: evidence from the 1958 British cohort. Health Econ 21:129–150

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Wagstaff A, Paci P, Van Doorslaer E (1991) On the measurement of inequalities in health. Soc Sci Med 33:545–557

    Article  PubMed  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut National d’Etudes Démographiques, 133 Boulevard Davout, 75980, Paris Cedex 20, France

    Damien Bricard, Florence Jusot, Myriam Khlat & Stéphane Legleye

  2. PSL, Université Paris-Dauphine, LEDa-LEGOS, Paris, France

    Florence Jusot

  3. French Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction (OFDT), Saint-Denis, France

    François Beck

  4. National Institute for Health Promotion and Health Education (INPES), Saint-Denis, France

    François Beck

  5. Cermes 3, Cesames Team (Research Centre Medicine, Sciences, Health, Mental Health, Health Policy), CNRS UMR 8211, Inserm U988, University of Paris Descartes, EHESS, Paris, France

    François Beck

  6. Inserm U1178, Paris, France

    Stéphane Legleye

Authors
  1. Damien Bricard
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Florence Jusot
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. François Beck
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Myriam Khlat
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Stéphane Legleye
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Damien Bricard.

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

Supplementary material 1 (DOCX 49 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Bricard, D., Jusot, F., Beck, F. et al. Educational inequalities in smoking over the life cycle: an analysis by cohort and gender. Int J Public Health 61, 101–109 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00038-015-0731-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Revised:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00038-015-0731-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation