Pregnant smokers who quit, pregnant smokers who don't: does history of XXXX make a difference?

@entity1 @entity146
More than half of @entity1 who smoke in the USA continue to do so while pregnant. While socioeconomic and demographic factors that distinguish pregnancy quitters from persistent smokers have been identified, less is known about behavioral factors that are associated with persistent smoking. Because smoking during pregnancy is not only an individual, but also a maternal behavior, it may have different behavioral correlates than @entity1 's smoking has in general. We propose a conceptual framework in which smoking during pregnancy is viewed as a maternal @entity146 . We explore this conceptualization by examining whether persistent smoking during pregnancy is associated with a pattern of psychosocial risk- and health-compromising behaviors in multiple domains, with pilot data from a small clinic-based sample. Data are presented for 96 predominantly Caucasian, working-class pregnant @entity1 recruited from prenatal clinics in the USA. Smoking during pregnancy was measured repeatedly by self-report and biochemical assay. @entity1 were non-smokers (37%), pregnancy quitters (17%), and persistent smokers (46%). These groups were compared in terms of their history of @entity146 in three domains: interpersonal difficulties, problems in adaptive functioning and problematic health behaviors. With few exceptions, smokers were more likely to have problematic relationships, poorer adaptive functioning and to engage in problematic health behaviors, than both pregnancy quitters and non-smokers. This pattern of @entity146 may interfere with the effectiveness of standard public health prenatal cessation interventions for a sub-group of @entity1 . Examining pregnancy smoking as part of a broader matrix of @entity146 may help to identify pregnant @entity1 most at risk for persistent smoking and inform the development of targeted interventions.
