Changes over time in weight concerns among women smokers engaged in the cessation process

Weight concerns have been reported by women smokers to be barriers to initial cessation and to sustained abstinence. This article examines the temporal patterns of weight concerns and self-efficacy for cessation among three groups of women smokers: non-quitters, short-term quitters, and long-term quitters. Subjects were 417 women aged 20-64 who had participated in a randomized smoking cessation intervention trial. Over the twelve-month follow-up, long-term quitters reported greater increases in weight gain, pain and worry related to weight, dieting behaviors, and self-efficacy for maintaining cessation in eating-related situations compared to non-quitters and short-term quitters. In multivariate analyses, increases in pain and worry about weight and in self-efficacy in eating-related situations were significantly associated with sustained abstinence. Cessation-specific weight concerns and dieting were not associated with sustained abstinence. Implications of these results for intervention design are discussed.