Cigarette smoking from adolescence to adulthood

In this chapter, findings from a long-term, cohort-sequential, multigenerational study of cigarette smoking are used to illustrate the importance of a developmental approach for (1) understanding trajectories of smoking behavior (in relation to other forms of tobacco use) and the conditions and challenges of the developmental periods that show transitions in smoking status (particularly adolescent smoking onset and challenges for parents with adolescent children), (2) understanding heterogeneity in these trajectories because differing trajectories may have different etiological underpinnings as well as different implications for the intergenerational transmission of smoking, (3) recognizing that development unfolds within the larger context of societal and historical change and that societal change can influence outcomes, and (4) considering development within a family systems and multigenerational context.