Interpretations of smoking in film by older teenagers

Abstract

Research testifies that images of tobacco use in popular films are highly pervasive and typically glamorised. There are concerns that these images may promote motivations to smoke in adolescents, but little is known about how these images are interpreted by members of this age group. A qualitative study was conducted to explore how older teenagers interpret and decode smoking imagery in film. This study builds on earlier work with a younger age group (12 and 13 years) to explore how various interpretations of smoking imagery shape and support common understandings about smoking among older teenagers.

Data were collected through focus groups. Eighty-eight 16 and 17 year old students were interviewed at school. Participants discussed their recollections of and responses to recently viewed films. Older teens were receptive to smoking imagery when it was used in a credible manner to portray an emotional state, sub-culture affiliation, and lifestyle. Experience as a smoker appeared to inflate the credibility of realistic smoking images, particularly those presented in gritty realism/drama film. Older teens perceived realistic images, as opposed to stereotypical images, as a salient reference to their own lives. Stereotypical images were also readily recalled and appeared to perform an important role in supporting misconceptions about smoking and contributing to popular ideologies about tobacco use. Stereotypical images presented in comedy and action genre also serve to present paradoxical and contradictory messages about tobacco use. In particular, participants recalled tobacco use in film as associated with stress and anxiety, drug use, and seduction. Film images of tobacco use in specific contexts appear to hold specific and significant meanings for older teens. Realistic images offered salient representations of the perceived reality of smoking for this group. Pervasive and credible smoking scenes in film may offer support and reassurance to older teens who currently smoke or hold ambivalent views about smoking. Consistent with younger adolescents, older teens presented a predominantly nonchalant response to smoking imagery in film, which is a powerful indicator of the pervasiveness and acceptability of smoking in general. In contrast with younger adolescent, older teens tend to draw upon their own experience with tobacco use when interpreting smoking images in film.

Introduction

Film depictions of tobacco have been popularised most notably since the rise of the movie star in the 1930s and 1940s (Shields, Carol, Balbach, & McGee, 1999; Stacey, 1994). During this period, images of Humphrey Bogart and other leading actors smoking were overtly glamorised, as were the growing number of feminine depictions (Escamilla, Cradock, & Kawachi, 2000; McIntosh, Bazzini, Smith, & Wayne, 1998). Tobacco companies appreciated the promotion that film stars afforded their product, as stars oozed sublime cool while drawing deeply on a cigarette. Today, after a brief decline in the use of tobacco in films during the 1970s and 1980s, the smoker has returned, this time to the multiplex cinema (Stockwell & Glantz, 1997). Tobacco use in film is now widely suspected to be highly pervasive and to have a specific youth appeal (Perry, 1999; Stockwell & Glantz, 1997; Distefan, Gilpin, Sargent, & Pierce, 1999; Goldstein, Sobel, & Newman, 1999).

The tobacco industry appears to be highly motivated to recruit new smokers, and it possesses an impressive track record of deception in order to achieve this. Marketing of tobacco to young people through popular culture effectively sidestepped current legislation surrounding advertising (Macfadyen, Hastings, & Mackintosh, 2000; Hoek, 1999). It is generally suspected that the tobacco industry is responsible for the placement of cigarette smoking in films, and empirical investigations have attempted to determine how these images may influence the initiation of smoking in adolescents (Tickle, Sargent, Dalton, Beach, & Healtherton, 2001; Gibson & Maurer, 2000; Hines, Saris, & Throckmorton-Belzer, 2000). Although research has focused almost exclusively on the role of promotional activities in the initiation of smoking among young adolescents, the present study is conducted with a sample of older teens, for many of whom smoking is an already established behaviour. This paper builds upon a previous study of younger adolescents (12 and 13 years) by exploring a sample of older (16 and 17 years) adolescents’ interpretations of smoking imagery in film (McCool, Cameron, & Petrie, 2001).

Social representation theory provides a framework for exploring adolescents’ perceptions of smoking representations in film and how representations (for example, tobacco use) assist in shaping collective understandings about pervasive social realities. Social representation theory also addresses how social groups draw upon their own collective (lay) understandings to make sense of and embellish cinematic representations (Sommer, 1998). Media communications, which lie at the core of social representation theory, are understood to be critical to both the construction and diffusion of what is understood as a ‘social representation’. Moreover, this framework primarily acknowledges the role of structural elements within media constructs, which may include the representational field (e.g. context, content, place), knowledge (e.g. quality and quantity of representations) and perceptions of the representation (Sommer, 1998). Rather than being universally ascribed, social representations relate to a central and accessible core of beliefs, which is determined or arranged according to ‘group-specific’ knowledge (Moscovici, 1983).

Although images of tobacco use may constitute a universal representation, the meanings attached to the images are likely to be determined according to group lifestyles, values, norms and identities (Sommer, 1998). In our previous study (McCool et al., 2001), for example, younger adolescents were found to perceive that glamorous, tough, and sexy smoker images are pervasive in film. However, despite the pervasiveness of these stereotyped images, scenes of smoking (especially in drama and action genre) were also regarded as realistic and accurate reflections of real life. Similarly, smoking (both in film and in real life) was perceived to be associated with stress relief, a marker of maturity and adult behaviour, and a symbol of self-image and cultural identity. These observations illustrate that meanings associated with tobacco images in film are shaped according to the viewer's own expectations and experiences with real life smoking. Moreover, these expectations and experiences are cultivated within the viewer's social and subgroup groups, which assist to define the subscribed lifestyles, norms, and identities.

Prevalent notions about sub-cultural identities and desirable or reliable images of smoker ‘types’ are critical in young peoples’ appraisals of smoking imagery (Amos, Currie, Gray, & Elton, 1998; Amos, Gray, Currie, & Elton, 1997; Banwell & Young, 1993). It is anticipated that older teens’ interpretations of smoking imagery may well be shaped by their common understandings about what is perceived to be credible and desirable within their own social worlds. Older teens represent a developmentally distinct group of adolescents; in relation to younger adolescents, their social parameters are more likely to offer greater independence, and autonomy. It is widely advocated that smoking is perceived by young people to be indicative of identity and the attainment of autonomy and independence (Amos & Cunningham-Burley, 1995; Banwell & Young, 1993; Perry, 1999). This theme did not emerge as a salient perception among the adolescents in our previous study, but it may become more predominant during later adolescence.

This study was developed to explore how older adolescents respond to smoking imagery presented in film and its meanings and relevance to their beliefs about smoking. Because of the dramatic developmental and social changes that occur over the course of adolescence, we cannot assume that observed patterns of interpretations made by younger adolescents are also common among older teens. In particular, it is important to explore the salience of smoking images for older teens who represent a group with relatively variable experiences with tobacco (‘lifestyle’, ‘addiction’, ‘habit’ and as an ‘identity’). The study locates the issue of smoking and film viewing, and smoking in films as social activities, which are mediated by interpretations of cultural acceptability. The interpretative focus of this research was positioned predominantly with the audience or viewers’ perceptions of smoking imagery in film. By privileging the audience's perceptions of smoking images in film, the perceived image is rendered as the representation, rather than the text itself.

The focus of the study is also on teenager's perceptions of ‘incidental’ smoking representations, rather than an assessment of tobacco product placement. Moreover, comparisons are made between the previous study with younger adolescents in order to illustrate the convergent and divergent interpretations of smoking imagery in media.