Exculpating the industry by weaponising the smoker’s friends and family
| Defence attorneys will often say: | |||||
| Defence | Plaintiff | FS | MWR | Example | |
| relatives* | 5342 | 2375 | 0.32 | 0.23 | “When people told him that they wanted him to quit smoking, like his wife, for example, he told them to mind their own business. He told his daughter, ‘I’m grown.’”67 |
| father/mother | 1670 | 567 | 0.26 | 0.27 | “He didn’t quit when his father … was diagnosed or died of lung cancer.”68 |
| husband/wife | 1614 | 895 | 0.37 | 0.39† | “His wife, the plaintiff in this case, and his daughters warned him over and over and over again.”69 |
| brother/sister | 705 | 216 | 0.24 | 0.32 | “You heard from her brother and sister that smoking was forbidden when they were kids…”50 |
| friend/s | 755 | 317 | 0.30 | 0.31 | “We heard from a couple of his co-workers and friends he enjoyed smoking.”70 |
| common knowledge | 72 | 10 | 0.13 | 0.43† | “All the plaintiffs’ experts admitted that the dangers and addictive nature of cigarettes were common knowledge.”71 |
P values <0.0001 for all FS and MWR score unless otherwise noted.
*Relatives include the terms wife, husband, mother, father, grandmother, grandfather, sister/s, brother/s, daughter/s, son/s, granddaughter/s, grandson/s, uncle/s and aunt/s.
†P value <0.001.
FS, frequency score; MWR, Mann-Whitney Rho.