The purpose of this study was to make a comparative analysis of smoking knowledge, attitude and behavior among children in their six year in elementary school to serve as a basis for the development of successful smoking prevention education program. The subjects were 600 boy and girl students in the sixth grade randomly selected from five elementary schools in north Chungcheong province. Data were collected for six days from September 2 through 7, 2002. To assess subjects smoking knowledge and attitude, Choi Hye-yeoung (2000)’s modified version of WHO(1982)’s Guidelines for the content of tobacco smoking surveys of the general population was again altered by this researcher for use in this study.
The collected data were analyzed with SAS program. The frequency, percentage, mean and standard deviation were calculated, and t-test Chi-square test, ANOVA, and Logistics regression procedures were employed. The brief findings of this study were as 1) Out of the 600 students investigated, 21.83 percent(131 students) had a smoking experience, and among these students, 1.83 percent(11) smoked at present. 2) The collective average in smoking knowledge was 13.04 out of 19 points. The smoking-experience group got a mean of 12.78, and the non-experienced group got a mean of 13.12. The latter group had a slightly better knowledge than the former, but the difference between the two was insignificant(p=0.416). 3) The collective average in smoking attitude was 34.45, out of 40 points. The non-experienced group got a mean of 35.41, and the experienced group got a mean of 30.77. The former group had a more desirable attitude than the latter, and the gap between the two groups was very significant(p=0.000). 4) The smoking knowledge was positively correlated to the smoking attitude(r=0.24, p=0.000). 5) As for connections between smoking knowledge and general characteristics, school grades(F =10.97, p=0.000), the sources of smoking information(F=3.00, p=0.000), father educational background(F=4.06, p=0.003) and gender(t =-2.31, p=0.21) made a significant difference to the smoking knowledge. 6) Concerning relations between smoking attitude and general characteristics, the smoking attitude was different according to gender (t = -4.53, po=0.000), school grades(F=7.96, p=0.000), smoking or non- smoking of siblings(F=5.86, p=0.000), presence or absence of smoking friends(F=3.07, p=0.003), family atmosphere(F=4.87, p=0.008), experience of going on errands to buy a pack of cigarettes(t = -2.50, p=0.012), father’s smoking or nonsmoking(F=4.87, p=0.026), and parent marital status (F=2.40, p=0.049). 7) Regarding connections between smoking experience and general characteristics, their smoking experience was different according to gender(x2=21.38, p=0.000), presence or absence of smoking friends (x2=55.81, p=0.000), smoking or nonsmoking of siblings(x2 = 15.11, p=0.004), experience of going on errands to buy a pack of cigarette(x2=7.50, p=0.006), mother’s smoking or nonsmoking(x2 = 13.34, p=0.009), female relative’s smoking or nonsmoking(x2 = 11.39, p=0.022), and mother’s job (x2=4.64, p=0.031). 8) The factors associated with the smoking experience were the number of smoking friends(Wald x2=29.62, p=0.000) and smoking attitude(Wald x2=42.54, p=0.000).
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