Passing through the Quad, at the corners of buildings and at bus stops, it is hard not to notice clouds of smoke – a sight that makes mass communication professor Judith Sylvester cringe.
“Hardly anyone comes to LSU without any previous experience with smoking,” said Sylvester, who has been conducting a smoking study for the past three years.
In 2000, as a part of the Health Excellence Fund attached to Louisiana’s tobacco settlement, the Louisiana Board of Regents awarded a $340,000 grant to the Manship School of Mass Communication in conjunction with Southern University, said Kim Hunter-Reed, Board of Regents deputy commissioner for public affairs.
Sylvester is using the money to study the effects of cigarette advertisements on college students, she said.
Focus groups and surveys show 30 percent of University students smoke. That number has not lowered since the study began, Sylvester said.
Of the 30 percent of smokers, 70 percent smoke Marlboro brand cigarettes and the rest smoke mostly Camels, she said.
While Marlboro and Camel were the top two favorite cigarettes for University students, Newports and Kools were the top two choices for Southern students. These two brands are rarely smoked on LSU’s campus according to the survey, Sylvester said.
Since cigarette manufacturers are marketing to two different audiences, the difference in cigarettes smoked at LSU and Southern shows how students are affected by advertisements, she said.
“This proves that marketing strategies work in two completely different ways for cigarettes,” she said. “The average person doesn’t know how duped they are.”
While the survey showed advertisements targeting different groups is effective for college students, Sylvester said part of the difference is an economic issue.
The numbers at Southern show that only 15 percent of their student population smoke, she said.
After the 36-cent tax increase on cigarettes went into effect in July 2002, 15 percent of smoking Southern students say they buy the cheapest brands.
“If a Southern student had a choice between a hamburger and a cigarette, they’d choose a hamburger,” Sylvester said.
Shewanda Magee, a sociology junior at LSU, said she smokes the cheapest cigarettes she can find.
“I’m not picky,” she said. “I’ll smoke Marlboros, Camels and Salems.”
Betty Briggs, an associate professor of social work at Southern and Sylvester’s partner in the survey, said Southern students are traditionally not frequent smokers, but graduate students, faculty and staff at Southern are more inclined to smoke.
Another part of the survey was to determine if smokers pay attention to negative smoking ads and the Surgeon General’s warning on cigarette packs, Sylvester said.
“Students who smoke do not see a connection between advertisements and their own smoking patterns,” she said.
Neither Julie Banta, an anthropology senior; Tuan Nguyen, an electrical engineering senior; Angela Lockett, an elementary education senior; or Magee – all smokers – think that they are affected by cigarette advertisements.
The survey showed smokers simply ignore the Surgeon General’s warning on cigarette packs, Sylvester said.
Banta said she realizes smoking is a bad thing and sees the warnings on the cigarette packs, but she does not think about it when she smokes.
Since President Bill Clinton passed a bill preventing cigarette companies from advertising at sporting events, they had to turn to alternative methods, Sylvester said.
Companies such as Camel give out free cigarettes at local Baton Rouge bars around campus to people 21 and older, she said.
Other marketing strategies such as collecting Camel points contribute to brand loyalty.
Most students who begin smoking a certain type of cigarette continue to smoke the same brand, she said.
Banta said she started smoking Marlboro Lights her junior year in high school because her friends smoked that brand.
She said she will not smoke anything but Marlboro Lights.
Sylvester recognizes the progress the United States has made on trying to reduce the amount of people who smoke but compares governmental regulations to those in Canada, where tobacco companies are forced to print graphic pictures of lung cancer on packs and cartons of cigarettes.
“That was really effective in Canada, but tobacco companies do not want that to happen in the U.S.,” she said.
Banta said she thinks a policy like the Canadian policy in the United States would be effective in deterring people from smoking.
On the other hand, Magee said she thinks Americans have a totally different thought process than Canadians.
“They can put a hacked-up lung on packs of cigarettes and people will still smoke,” she said.