An Exploratory Study on the Risk Behaviours and Its Associated Psychosocial Factors in Hong Kong Chinese Youth Smokers
Condition: Risk Behaviours
Study type: Observational

Summary: 
      The aims of this study were: (1) to examine the risk behaviours, lifestyle and its associated
      psychosocial factors for youth smokers; and (2) to explore the relationships among
      self-esteem, depressive symptoms and quality of life in youth smokers.
    

Detailed description: 
      The first approach is to conduct a qualitative interview on 30 youth smokers or until
      saturation, with the aim to examine the risk behaviours, lifestyle and its associated
      psychosocial factors for youth smokers.

      Participants will be invited to complete a questionnaire on their demographic and
      socio-economic characteristics. An audiotaped semi-structured interview will then be
      conducted individually to each participant by two research assistants; with one research
      assistant will act as the interviewer to encourage the informants to freely express their
      feelings, thoughts and ideas and another will act as an observer and document any non-verbal
      language used by the informants. Prior to the data collection, written consent will be
      obtained from their parents and the participants will be invited to sign the child assent
      forms.

      The second approach is to conduct a quantitative study to compare the self-esteem, depressive
      symptoms and quality of life between 100 youth smokers and 100 non-smokers.

      For the quantitative approach, 100 youth smokers and 100 non-smokers will be recruited
      through the outreach programme organized by the smoking cessation research team of the School
      of Nursing. Such programme is a promotional activity to publicise the Youth Quitline and to
      raise the awareness of no smoking among youth in the community. A structured questionnaire
      will be used to obtain demographics and socio-economic characteristics of each subject.

      Qualitative approach After completing the interviews, the recordings will be fully
      transcribed, verbatim, in Cantonese to capture nuances of expression unique to the dialect,
      and selected quotations relevant to the themes will be later translated into English. The
      analyses begin with an intensive examination of the transcriptions to search for general
      constructs and themes. Special attention will be given to constructs that diverged from the
      major topics as framed by the guiding questions.

      The transcriptions will be first coded using the open coding method. As the number of codes
      grew, some closely related codes will be merged, resulting in a smaller, more manageable set
      of codes. Selective coding will then be adopted to code the transcriptions using the
      established categories. During the coding process, any inconsistencies in the interpretation
      of quotations or the assignment of codes will be resolved through discussions with the
      research team members. Finally, a complete set of codes will be generated to facilitate
      comparisons and the development of themes and categories.

      Quantitative approach Data analysis will be performed using the SPSS, version 20.0 for
      Windows. The internal consistencies of various instruments used in the study will be
      determined by calculating their Cronbach. Descriptive statistics will be used to calculate
      the mean, standard deviation, and range of the scores of the different scales. The
      relationships among the scores of the CES-DC, RSES, PedsQL v. 4.0 and the participants' age,
      sex, education attainment, and smoking status will be investigated using the Pearson
      product-moment correlation coefficient. An independent t-test will be conducted to compare
      the mean scores of the CES-DC, RSES, PedsQL v. 4.0 between youth smokers and non-smokers.
    

Observational model: Case-Control
Time perspective: Cross-Sectional
Sampling method: Probability Sample
Study population: 
        all current youth smokers aged 25 or below in Hong Kong