Findings on teen smoking and deterrent pictures

Online journal Tobacco Control carried out two surveys of over 1,000 11 to 16-year-olds in the UK were questioned about their response to warnings in 2008 and a further 1,000 were questioned in 2011.

• Over half of the teenager in both surveys (68% and 75%) had never smoked and 17% and 22% had experimented with cigarettes.
• One in 10 of the teenager questioned were regular smokers - they lit up at least once a week.

• Half of those questioned in both surveys said they had 'often' or 'very often' noticed the warnings on packs, and around one in five had read them very often or looked closely at them.

• The teenagers' ability to recall images depicting diseased lungs, rotten teeth and neck cancer, remained below 10% while three text warnings on the back of packs with no supporting images were recalled by less than 1% in either survey.