Cigarette Smoking in Popular Films: Does It Increase Viewers' Likelihood to Smoke?1

The effect of viewing smoking in popular films was investigated. Participants were instructed to rate main characters in scenes from popular films on 12 characteristics (e. g., attractive, sexy, sociable). One group watched 6 scenes from popular films in which the main character they rated was smoking. The other group watched scenes from the same 6 films in which they rated the same main characters who were not smoking. The participants rated the female characters shown smoking less favorably on all rated characteristics, but not the male characters. The male regular and occasional smokers had a higher current desire to smoke if the film characters they had viewed smoked. Both female and male participants who viewed the characters smoking were more likely to indicate a likelihood to smoke than were the participants who viewed the nonsmoking scenes.