In March 2011, the New Zealand Government committed to a goal of New Zealand becoming smokefree by the year 2025, where less than 5% of the population smokes (The New Zealand Government, 2011). To regularly monitor public opinions about tobacco control and aid the development of appropriate health promotion strategies, the Health Promotion Agency’s (HPA’s) Youth Insights Survey (YIS) monitors Year 10 students’ behaviours, attitudes and knowledge on a range of tobacco-related topics, including the ‘Smokefree 2025’ goal.
Methodology
Participants in the 2014 YIS were asked about whether they were aware of the ‘Smokefree 2025’ goal, and if they thought many people would still be smoking in the year 2025. Responses to these questions were examined by smoking status1, ethnicity, gender and school decile status. See the ‘About the Youth Insights Survey’ section for more detail and the relevant comparison groups.
Smoking status was not controlled for when looking at subgroup differences by gender, ethnicity and school decile status, as awareness of ‘Smokefree 2025’ did not differ by smoking status (see next section).
Further analyses were undertaken to examine changes over time as these questions were also asked in 2012. Only those differences between groups that were statistically significant (p < .05) are reported.
Key Results
• Around one in three young people were aware of the Government’s ‘Smokefree 2025’ goal. Those who were more likely to be aware of the goal were non-Māori, male or attending a high decile school.
• One in seven young people thought that hardly anybody will be smoking by 2025, with males being more likely to agree than females.
• Young people in 2014 were less likely to agree that hardly anybody will be smoking by 2025 than young people in 2012.