Study Why some young women deliberately smoke during pregnancy

Women misinterpret health warnings on packaging
Smoking during pregnancy should actually be taboo. Because it is associated with many health risks for the child. In the light of this, it sounds strange that many Australian women only start smoking when they are already pregnant. As the scientist Simone Dennis of the Australian National University (ANU) has now found out, this is obviously due to the warnings on cigarette packets, which are misinterpreted by the pregnant women.

Increased risk of asthma and mental illness
Smoking is unhealthy - there's nothing to turn around. Especially in pregnancy, women should therefore refrain from cigarettes to protect their unborn child. Because the possible damages are manifold. It is known, among other things, that babies are often born prematurely by smokers and later suffer from asthma more often. Similarly, the risk of diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease increases. The mental health of the offspring is also in danger. Recently, US researchers found that children developed schizophrenia significantly more often in later life when their mothers had smoked during pregnancy.

An Australian scientist now discovered the reason why many young women smoke during pregnancy. (Image: highwaystarz / fotolia.com)

Warnings should deter
But giving up smoking is hard for many women. Therefore, drastic warnings on cigarette packs should discourage and help smokers to get rid of their addictions. However, this measure seems to have the opposite effect on some women. Because, as an Australian scientist found out in a ten-year study, the warnings are apparently quickly ignored or misinterpreted.

Women are afraid of heavy babies
Simone Dennis of the Australian National University (ANU), among other things, spoke to a group of 16-year-olds who smoked during their pregnancy as part of the research for their book Smokefree. They hoped to reduce the birth weight of their offspring, according to the scientist, according to a statement from the university. The reason for this assumption was therefore the warnings on cigarette packs in Australia, because this is to be read among other things that smoking can reduce the birth weight of the baby. "The young women were scared because they were small themselves. The worst thing that could happen to them was getting a huge baby. They had read on the packet that smoking can reduce the baby's birth weight. But of course the warning on the boxes was not meant, "said Simone Dennis, according to the message.

The interviewed women smoked more often than before, some of them had even started with the pregnancy - in the hope that the child thereby remains as small as possible. The supposedly clear messages on the boxes are therefore not enough to discourage smokers: "It does not work outright to tell people 'smoking is dangerous' and then stop them as soon as they have the information. People are creative when it comes to interpreting the meaning of a message, "says the scientist. (No)