The association of parental self-efficacy and parent-youth connectedness with youth smoking intentions

Little attention has been paid to understanding how parents of differing race/ethnicity perceive their effectiveness in exercising anti-smoking parenting practices and how these behaviors affect youth's smoking intentions. We explored the association of parent-youth connectedness and parental self-efficacy and youths' smoking intentions in a group of African American and Caucasian never-smokers. Based on Social Bonding Theory and Social Learning Theory, a questionnaire was administered to nonsmoking, 9-16-year-old youth and parent dyads, assessing youth smoking intentions and parental measures of connectedness and self-efficacy. Youth risk factors for intending to smoke were increased parent-youth conflict and protective factors were increased parental monitoring, increased parental rule setting, and higher parental self-efficacy. Parent-youth connectedness and parental self-efficacy did not differ by parental smoking status or by race/ethnicity. Our findings underscore the importance of strong parenting practices and parental self-efficacy in protecting against youth intention to smoke and these may be important to target in future interventions.