ABSTRACT
This chapter describes certain British studies that sought to explore the meanings of moking to adolescents. It deals with a brief overview of the nature of the several studies. The chapter provides a detailed description of the quantitative, questionnaire phase of the studies. The questionnaires used in both the Sussex and the London studies measured conventional demographic factors and items about smoking attitudes and behaviour. Questionnaire data were collected initially in six mixed-gender state secondary schools in Sussex, southern England. In the Sussex study, pupils in six schools completed the questionnaire in both the autumn and the summer terms of the same academic year. Conventional statistical methods have been employed to analyse the ratings produced by the impression formation task. In both the London and Sussex studies a computer-assisted form of content analysis was used to manage the vast amounts of material generated by focus group discussion and by family interviews.
