UC Berkeley

Abstract

The Examination of Time Orientation of Smokers

in a Smoking Cessation Interventation

By

Preety Kalra

Doctor of Philosophy in Epidemiology

University of California, Berkeley

Professor William Satariano, Chair

Time perspective may be an important predictor of success in smoking cessation programs. Thus, it is important to better understand the role of time perspective for smoking cessation. More specifically, there needs to a greater understanding of the role that time perspective plays in initiating a quit attempt and in the success of that quit attempt. We hope the information generated from this study will allow us to better understand the role of time perspective and behavior change and to make recommendations for improving smoking cessation treatment programs. Such a project would be valuable because it would allow for identification of specific attributes of the individuals who are more likely to succeed in a smoking cessation intervention and for tailoring of referrals to different forms of smoking cessation treatment to make them better matched to individual recipients. This individualized approach would conserve resources by allocating patients more appropriately to treatment. Gaining a clearer perspective on the relationship between time orientation and smoking cessation outcome will help us understand if treatment programs are appropriately designed for those who enter such programs.

Although there is some information relating time perspective to substance use there is only limited information on the role of time perspective in individuals' making a smoking cessation attempt and whether it fluctuates for those trying to quit. Time perspective may be an important predictor of treatment response in smoking cessation programs. More specifically, there needs to a greater understanding of the role that time perspective plays in initiating a quit attempt and in the success of that quit attempt. Gaining a clearer perspective on the relationship between time orientation and smoking cessation outcome will allow us to guide patients with different time perspectives to appropriate smoking cessation treatment programs.

The proposed study investigated time orientation as a predictor of individuals' successfully completing a smoking cessation treatment program. The aims of this study are to identify the time orientation of patients at entry into a smoking cessation program and to explore the relationship of time orientation to other potential predictors of smoking cessation.

We will assess the validity of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory in an on-going intervention trial. We will obtain psychometric data on the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory in an adult population at the initiation of an intervention. We will use exploratory factor analysis to determine the most appropriate number of dimensions.

Then we will identify the time orientation of patients at entry into a smoking cessation program and to explore the relationship of time orientation to other potential predictors of smoking cessation. We will conduct a cross-sectional analysis and then examine how time orientation varies across socioeconomic factors of the population. We will also examine whether a single item of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory proves to be more predictive than a domain of the scale. Having a single item that could be used to screen participants in health care settings would alleviate the time necessary to classify an individual by time orientation and allow for tailoring of health interventions to match individual to treatment.

Lastly, we will examine the change for each individual item of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory and the number of cigarettes smoked from baseline to six months post-intervention. We will also assess change for each of the five domains, present fatalistic, present hedonistic, future, past negative and past positive and number of cigarettes smoked from baseline to follow-up.

Characterizing the time orientation of smokers and its relation with smoking cessation is the first step toward designing future tailored smoking cessation interventions that would better meet the cessation needs of smokers. Because of the substantial health, quality of life and economic benefits of smoking cessation, even later in life, determining if time perspective is a predictor of success could have a potentially large impact on public health. Such a study would be valuable because it would allow for identification of specific attributes of the individuals who are more likely to succeed in a smoking cessation intervention and would allow for tailoring of referrals and for appropriate modification of smoking cessation programs to make them better matched to individual recipients.