Employee characteristics and health belief variables related to smoking cessation engagement attitudes

Workplace smoking cessation programs can effectively assist employees to quit smoking. However, little is known about employees' attitudes towards engagement in workplace smoking cessation programs.

This study aimed to address the limited understanding of the interaction between employee characteristics and their health beliefs toward engaging in a workplace smoking cessation program.

Self-report data was collected from 897 employees of a mining company operating in two remote towns in Australia. The majority of participants were male (73%), the mean age was 36.9 years (SD = 11.5). Chi square tests of independence were used to analyze relationships between employee characteristics and smoking cessation engagement attitudes. Engagement attitudes included: A desire to cease smoking; desire for assistance with the smoking cessation process; and intention to participate in a workplace smoking intervention.

The findings from this study indicated that attitudes towards engagement in smoking cessation programs varied for mining employees according to gender, age, perceived severity, perceived self-efficacy, and stage of readiness to change.

These findings provide insights that health promotion practitioners may apply to inform the design and marketing of effective workplace smoking cessation programs for similar employees.