Prevalence of cigarette and water pipe smoking and their predictors among Iranian adolescents

Widespread tobacco use, along with its induced diseases and subsequent deaths, comprise one of the biggest threats to public health in the world. Thus, we aimed to investigate the prevalence of cigarette and water pipe smoking and their predictors among Iranian adolescents.

A total of 1524 adolescent students aged 14-18 years (764 boys and 760 girls) were randomly selected. The participants attended governmental, semi-governmental, and non-governmental schools in the city of Sanandaj, Iran in 2013. Data were collected using the "Sherer General Self-efficacy" and demographic questionnaire. Multivariate Logistic binary regresion analysis was conducted to determine the predictors.

The prevalence rates of cigarette and water pipe smoking were 9.5% and 10.4%, respectively. About 3.7% of the adolescents used both cigarette and water pipe and 16% used at least one of these. Compared with girls, prevalence of both cigarette (13.1% vs. 6.4%) and water pipe (13.7% vs. 7.1%) smoking was higher among the boys. Male sex, father's education of secondary school, and use of water pipe were identified as cigarette smoking risk factors, while technical and commercial educational fields and attending non-governmental school were its protective factors. Risk factors of the use of water pipe were currently working, higher age and cigarette smoking, father's education of high school, father's occupation of employee and mother's education of a diploma degree, while higher self-efficacy and attending non-governmental school were its protective factors.

The high prevalence of cigarette and water pipe smoking in adolescents continues to rise. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct further studies on effective factors on the onset and continuation of tobacco use.