Suppressing Smoking Behavior and Its Effects Essay

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Are you struggling to quit smoking? Did you know that your efforts may be the cause of increased smoking? Researchers have established that suppressing a behavior leads people to think more about the suppressed issue. These results were taken from a three-week study conducted on a group of participants who were trying to quit their smoking behavior. The group was contrasted with a control group whose participants were smokers who had not expressed the desire to quit their smoking behavior. Over the observation period, the researchers were able to establish a unique pattern of behavior rebound that may make the process of quitting smoking more complicated.

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The researchers observed that during the first and the second weeks of the suppressed behavior, the participants successfully managed to reduce their intake of cigarettes. This was attributed to their efforts to reduce cigarette intake consciously. As participants continued with the suppressed behavior, it was observed that they become more consciously aware of their suppressed needs. Somehow, this led to an increased desire to take more cigarettes in the second week of the observation period. However, there was no immediate increase in the number of cigarettes taken by the participants as they struggled to quit smoking. This resulted in increased levels of stress as the participants reported that they were thinking about smoking more than when they were not cautiously controlling their smoking habit.

The increased thoughts about smoking which were above the average number of times that the smokers who were not trying to quit smoking thought about their smoking behavior led the psychologist to believe that a conscious effort to change a specific behavior leads to a rebound of the suppressed behavior (Erskine et al., 2010). This makes quitting the identified behavior even harder. As the participants struggled to suppress the behavior in the second week, they became stressed and even generated a greater urge to smoke. This means that the more people suppress a thought, the more they think about it, and thus, the more they are likely to do what they were suppressing.

In week three, it was observed that the group that was trying to quit smoking smoked more than the group that was not trying to quit smoking. Psychologist attributed the rebound behavior to the effects of suppression as the group that was trying to suppress their smoking urges constantly thought about their smoking behavior. Therefore, they were more in constant thought of their behavior, and thus they were prone to smoking more than their counterparts who were not trying to quit the behavior. Due to the stress associated with the suppressed behavior, the researchers observed that during the third week of the observations, there was a tendency among the participants to increase their average smoking habit.

The research findings have put the whole concept of behavior modification into jeopardy. The new concept and the newly developed ironic process theory that explains the rebound behavior observed among the research participants is an indication that the general perception of behavior modification may have to be changed. Otherwise, how do you explain the raised cigarette consumption in week three? The research has huge implications in the field of behavior modification as it explains why some behavior modification efforts are not successful among the selected participants.

Reference

Erskine, J., A., K., Georgiou, G., J. and Kvavilashvili, L. (2010). I Suppress, Therefore I Smoke: Effects of Thought Suppression on Smoking Behavior. Psychological Science. 21 (1225).

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IvyPanda. 2020. "Suppressing Smoking Behavior and Its Effects." May 18, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/suppressing-smoking-behavior-and-its-effects/.

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IvyPanda. "Suppressing Smoking Behavior and Its Effects." May 18, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/suppressing-smoking-behavior-and-its-effects/.

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