Brett Doussan remembers how stressful his life was after Hurricane Katrina wiped out his hometown of New Orleans. Doussan, a communication studies junior, said he was especially stressed because while he was in Baton Rouge when the hurricanes hit, he worried about the rest of his family that endured Katrina’s wrath in New Orleans. As his stress level increased, so did his smoking. “I smoked up until the point Katrina hit, and after that, I started smoking a lot more,” Doussan said. “I went from smoking a pack every few days to about a pack a day. There was definitely an increase.” A survey conducted by the University’s SmokingWords campaign and Tobacco-Free Living in December 2006 found rates increased from about 23 percent prior to Katrina to about 28 percent today. The survey asked students, faculty and staff questions about their stress levels, how much they smoked, if at all, and if their smoking increased as a response to stress and the hurricanes. According to a summary written by University associate professor Dr. Judith Sylvester, the survey concluded stress levels rose after Katrina and “smoking increased as a means of coping with stress and boredom.” Sylvester said the study found a strong correlation between smoking and stress. She said stress both triggers smoking and increases its frequency. She found many students, faculty and staff members said they quit smoking and started again because of stressful situations, boredom or simply because they are around other smokers, which were all factors linked to Katrina and Rita. Chancellor Sean O’Keefe’s wife, Laura O’Keefe, previously told The Daily Reveille her husband experienced the same struggle between stress and smoking. Laura O’Keefe said he quit and started again after Sept. 11. He quit soon after and began smoking again during the hectic fall 2005 semester when the hurricanes hit. Chancellor O’Keefe declined to comment. Melvenia Jones, an employee at Pizza Hut in the LSU Student Union, said stress influences her smoking habits by causing her to smoke more. She agrees that boredom makes her smoke more, especially when it is slow at work. Jones said the hurricanes affected her habit somewhat. “I was stressed because the cost of living went up,” she said. “I didn’t smoke more after the hurricanes because I couldn’t really afford to.” Robert O’Neil, sociology professor, said people smoke to relieve stress. O’Neil said he quit smoking 11 years ago, but as a result of a highly stressful situation, he picked up a pack of cigarettes and has been smoking since. O’Neil said Hurricane Rita affected him more so than Katrina by dropping tree limbs on his truck, causing about $7,000 in damages, but he feels the stress from that situation did not cause him to smoke more than he normally would. Although Sylvester is strongly involved in her anti-smoking campaign, SmokingWords, she does mention there is an upside for smokers. “In the very short term, it does relieve stress, but in the long term it doesn’t,” Sylvester said. “Students say, ‘Oh, I do it because it relieves my stress,’ but there are long-term effects that some choose to ignore.” A similar study was conducted by the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston about nine months after the hurricanes. The study surveyed 5,100 middle and high school students who reported to be smokers. The study concluded the teenagers smoked as a way to cope with stress, boredom, death of family members or friends and damaged homes. The study reported physical damage was noticeable, but psychological damage tended to remain hidden. Authors of the study concluded it is important to address the situation and give the teenagers the help they need instead of letting them turn to cigarettes for a stress reliever. Sylvester said it is important to reduce the amount of people who smoke to relieve stress. She said instead of turning to cigarettes, “stress reduction education should be a priority, especially on college campuses.”