Quitting Smoking and Motivation
Motivation in relation to quitting smoking has many factors, which influence the strength of that motivation. Extrinsic and Intrinsic factors both influence the motivation to stop smoking. Heredity is also thought to play a part in those who can stop smoking and those who cannot. Finally, the environment of smokers is either supportive in reinforcing motivation to quit smoking or is exactly the opposite and reinforces the habit.
Extrinsic and Intrinsic Factors
According to Lambert Decker (2005, pp. 254-257) extrinsic and intrinsic factors play an important role in the motivation to quit addictions such as smoking or in one of their case studies in the abstinence of cocaine use. Decker (2005) explains that offering an incentive to quit is more effective in motivating those trying to quit a habit than leaving the quitting to intrinsic motivation. In further studies, the frequency and timing of motivation was the subject of the study and if a choice is available, the longer period of incentive will be chosen. This tendency to choose a better reinforcement is known as melioration. Melioration exhibits a behavior of matching the best alternatives for reinforcement through changing the choice of reinforcement dependent on the benefit or strength of that reinforcement.
Decker (2005) goes on to say that, extrinsic factors are one influence on motivation but intrinsic factors also influence motivation. These factors differ in source of influence. Extrinsic factors are there not from choice but rather appear from a separate source than ones own mind. Money is an easy example. An unpleasant task is often performed to acquire money or through some other extrinsic motivator but an enjoyable task is often done simply for the fun of that task. Decker (2005) gives the example of a professional baseball player who ceased to enjoy the game he loved after receiving pay for playing.
In relation to smoking, a smoker may find the motivation to quit smoking from the satisfaction of proving strength of character in a cold turkey quit rather than from the influence of others forcing the cessation of smoking through nagging or throwing the smoker’s cigarettes away each time they appear.
Heredity and the Environment
Jane G. Brust (1998) wrote an article about the findings of Dr. Margaret R. Spitz, chairperson of the Department of Epidemiology at M. D. Anderson. According to Brust (1998), Spitz and her colleagues found evidence that a gene trait may be a factor in smokers who are unable to quit. Previous research has found that nicotine affects the release of dopamine in neurotransmitters in the brain. The dopamine transmitters are not all the same and in fact, several types exist. In the study, Dr. Spitz found a difference in the coding on one chromosome, which has relation to one kind of dopamine transmitter. This difference in encoding is inherited. The type of transmitter known as the B1 transmitter was found to be in a little over 30% of smokers in the test group and 0% in the control group of who had never smoked.
The environment is a substantial factor in whether smokers have motivation to quit. In the United States, the social stigma against smoking is much higher than in other nations. This is largely due to advertising and education. BBC News (2002) reported that thousands of young people are starting smoking each year in the Philippines, in fact up to 50,000. This is an effect of the environment since the laws regulating smoking in the Philippines and other Asian countries are very lax. The author’s own experience living in Japan is that smoking in Japan is still acceptable and most public places continue to have areas for smoking. However, in the last 15 years Japan has begun to enforce regulations about areas where smoking is allowable. Education in Japan still has a long way to go and most smokers smoke in their homes and around their children.
The amount of time to smoke is also a strong influence on the motivation to quit smoking. A very busy person will find it easier to quit because of limits of time available to smoke. This has a two-fold affect. One factor is the amount of nicotine in an extremely busy smoker will be less than another smoker who has plenty of time to smoke. In addition, a nervous person will smoke more frequently and smoke a greater number of cigarettes than a relaxed person. Furthermore, since smokers smoke more when nervous a nervous person associates the need anytime anxiety strikes. In contrast, a relaxed person may associate the need in another way such as smoking when there is a chance for social interaction. Tolerance is another key environmental factor. Family members may be tolerant of a smoker in the house or they may not. If a smoker is continually reminded that they stink it may increase motivation to cease. In contrast, if those around the smoker are very polite and tolerant of this problem the tolerance is a form of reinforcement of continuing the habit. An environmental factor not often considered is the modernization of tobacco. Additives to cigarettes such as chemicals to cause faster burning and chemicals to enhance the speed of nicotine absorption ironically may be a motivating factor for quitting. This would be because they increase cases of cancer. Of course, chemicals may increase addiction and thus be a de-motivator as well.
Conclusion
Smoking is an addiction that takes motivation to cease. Incentive to quit smoking or other addictions has been shown to a key factor in the degree of motivation addicts have to quit using. Incentive to quit often takes the form of extrinsic motivation but is not the only type of reinforcement. Intrinsic factors also are an incentive for trying to quit tobacco addiction. These factors may come in the form of satisfaction of achieving the goal of quitting or even the feeling of good health an individual may experience after overcoming an addiction. Hereditary influence in quitting smoking is now thought to occur in an affect on the dopamine neurotransmitters. A human may be literally born to have a hard time quitting smoking. In addition, the environment may contribute to keeping an individual smoking if the environment has positive reinforcement to continue the habit. In contrast, the environment may be supportive of quitting smoking through negative social stigma and laws regulating smoking. Smoking is an age-old habit and finding motivation to quit is not a new subject. However, the ability to control motivation in any endeavor and the source of that motivation is just beginning to be understood.
References
BBC News, (2002). Asia’s smoking addiction, Retrieved April 24, 2008 from
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/2012446.stm
Brust J.G., (1998). Study finds possible hereditary component to
nicotine addiction, Retrieved April 24, 2008 from http://www3.mdanderson.org/public/
conquest/public_html//summer98/heredit.htm
Deckers, L., (2005). Motivation, Biological, Psychological, and Environmental, Second Edition,
Published by Allyn and Bacon. Copyright © 2005 by Pearson Education, Inc.
