Elsevier

Addictive Behaviors

Volume 23, Issue 3, May–June 1998, Pages 395-398
Addictive Behaviors

Short Communications
Who smokes in hollywood? characteristics of smokers in popular films from 1940 to 1989

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0306-4603(97)00071-3Get rights and content

Abstract

We examined how smokers were depicted in 100 popular films spanning 5 decades. Smokers were depicted as more romantically and sexually active than nonsmokers and as marginally more intelligent than nonsmokers. Smokers and nonsmokers did not differ in terms of attractiveness, goodness, socioeconomic status, aggression, friendliness, or outcome at film’s end. Thus, if anything, smokers are depicted a bit more positively than nonsmokers. We compared Hollywood’s depiction of smokers to real-world demographics on smoking and found that Hollywood’s depiction of smoking tends to ignore the negative consequences and correlates (e.g., ill health, low socioeconomic status, aggressive behavior) of smoking.

Section snippets

Selection of target films

We sampled films from among the 20 top-grossing films for each year from 1940–1989. Twenty films from each of the 5 decades were randomly selected.

Rating procedure

At least three trained raters rated each film. They were instructed to rate all characters that appeared in what the rater considered to be a significant number of scenes. Characters were rated on the following dimensions:

  • 1.

    Smoking: If at any point in the film a character smoked a cigarette or cigar, raters indicated that the character was a smoker.

Reliability of ratings

Reliability was assessed by randomly selecting 15 films from our sample. We then entered the ratings of the first three raters for these films as variables and calculated coefficient alphas. Reliabilities across raters were well above acceptable levels across all dimensions rated, ranging from a low of .74 (for intelligence) to a high of .94 (for tobacco use).

Frequency of smoking

Overall, 21% of the characters rated smoked at least once during the film. There is a general decline in the number of characters who

Depiction of smokers versus nonsmokers

Based on the ratings of 832 characters appearing in 100 popular films, we found that smokers are depicted as more romantically and sexually active than nonsmokers and as marginally more intelligent than nonsmokers. Otherwise, there is little to distinguish smokers from nonsmokers in films. This pattern of results might be summarized by suggesting that, if anything, smokers are depicted a bit more positively than nonsmokers. There is no evidence of smoking being linked with any negative

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