Abstract
Background and aims: Cigarette smoking takes place within a cultural and social context. Political views and practices are an important part of that context. To gain a better understanding of smoking, it may be helpful to understand its association with voting patterns as an expression of the political views and practices of the population who smoke. This study aimed to assess the association between cigarette smoking and voting intentions and to examine how far any association can be explained by sociodemographic factors and alcohol use.
Methods: Pooled monthly representative repeat cross-sectional household surveys of adults (16+) in England (N = 55,482) between 2015-2020 were used to assess the association between cigarette smoking status and voting intentions, and whether this was accounted for by age, occupational grade, gender, region and alcohol use. Voting intention was measured by asking ‘How would you vote if there were a General Election tomorrow?’ Respondents chose from a list of the major English political parties or indicated their intention not to vote.
Results: In adjusted multinomial regression, compared with intending to vote Conservative (majority party of government during the period), being undecided (aOR1.22 [1.13-1.33] <0.001), intending to vote Labour (aOR1.27 [1.16-1.36] <0.001), to vote “Other” (aOR1.54 [1.37-1.72] <0.001), or not to vote (aOR1.93 [1.77-2.11] <0.001) was associated with higher odds of current relative to never smoking rates. Intending to vote for the Liberal Democrats was associated with a significant lower odds of current smoking prevalence (aOR0.80 [0.70-0.91] <0.001) compared with intending to vote Conservative.
Conclusions: Controlling for a range of other factors, current as compared with never-smokers appear more likely to intend not to vote, to be undecided, to vote for Labour or a non-mainstream party, and less likely to vote for the Liberal Democrats, compared with the Conservative party.
Methods: Pooled monthly representative repeat cross-sectional household surveys of adults (16+) in England (N = 55,482) between 2015-2020 were used to assess the association between cigarette smoking status and voting intentions, and whether this was accounted for by age, occupational grade, gender, region and alcohol use. Voting intention was measured by asking ‘How would you vote if there were a General Election tomorrow?’ Respondents chose from a list of the major English political parties or indicated their intention not to vote.
Results: In adjusted multinomial regression, compared with intending to vote Conservative (majority party of government during the period), being undecided (aOR1.22 [1.13-1.33] <0.001), intending to vote Labour (aOR1.27 [1.16-1.36] <0.001), to vote “Other” (aOR1.54 [1.37-1.72] <0.001), or not to vote (aOR1.93 [1.77-2.11] <0.001) was associated with higher odds of current relative to never smoking rates. Intending to vote for the Liberal Democrats was associated with a significant lower odds of current smoking prevalence (aOR0.80 [0.70-0.91] <0.001) compared with intending to vote Conservative.
Conclusions: Controlling for a range of other factors, current as compared with never-smokers appear more likely to intend not to vote, to be undecided, to vote for Labour or a non-mainstream party, and less likely to vote for the Liberal Democrats, compared with the Conservative party.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 2254 |
| Number of pages | 12 |
| Journal | BMC Public Health |
| Volume | 21 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 11 Dec 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:SC, CMQ and FDV have no conflicts of interest to declare. EB and JB have received unrestricted research funding to study smoking cessation from companies who manufacture smoking cessation medications. RW is an unpaid director of the Unlocking Behaviour Change Community Interest Company. LS has received a research grant and honoraria for talk and travel expenses from manufacturers of smoking cessation medications (Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson).
Funding Information:
SC, JB and EB receive salary support from Cancer Research UK (C1417/A22962).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s).
Keywords
- Tobacco
- health inequality
- inequity
- political participation
- health behaviour
- voting
- smoking
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This is the final published version of the article (version of record). It first appeared online via BMC at 10.1186/s12889-021-12304-4. Please refer to any applicable terms of use of the publisher.
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