Mothers should not smoke during pregnancy, nicotine, which crosses the placental barrier, may affect the female fetus during an important period of development so as to predispose the brain to the addictive influence of nicotine. Prenatal exposure to smoking has previously been linked with impairments in memory, learning, cognition, and perception in the growing child. Subsequent follow-up after 12 years suggest that regardless of the amount or duration of current or past maternal smoking, the strongest correlation between maternal smoking and a daughter's smoking occurred when the mother smoked during pregnancy. When comparing the use of alcohol, cigarettes, and other drugs, only cigarette use did not decline substantially among high school senior among 1981 to 1991. Research also revealed that approximately three fourths of adult regular smokers smoke their first cigarette before the age of 18.
Many teenagers begin smoking to feel grow-up.
Young children who see older children or family members smoking cigarettes are going to equate smoking with being grown up. Patterns of both drinking and smoking, which are closely associated, are strongly influenced by the lifestyles of family members peers and by the environments in which they live. Minimal, moderate, and heavy levels of drinking, smoking, and drug use, among family members are strongly associated with very similar patterns of use among adolescents. Parents who smoke and wish they didn't should concentrate on their own efforts to stop and hope that their offspring get the message. Another good view of smoking among young people can be obtained from the federal government's Annual National Survey of drug use among seniors, and now other high school students.