When Are Smokers Likely To Think About Quitting?

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there is an estimated 1 billion smokers worldwide. In the United States alone, nearly 44 million adults are smokers. Besides cancers, cigarette smoking can increase a person’s risk of getting many chronic diseases including respiratory disease, heart disease, high blood pressure and stroke.

There is no excuse for smokers not to kick the habit that could actually bring them so much harm. Data provided by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) showed that about 70 percent of American smokers say they want to quit, but each year, a little more than half make an attempt. 

A paper that was published online October 28, 2013 in in the journal ‘JAMA Internal Medicine’ revealed that smokers are more likely to consider quitting smoking on Mondays than on any other day of the week. The findings were the result of a global analysis of weekly Google search terms by researchers from San Diego State University and other institutions.

After looking at Google logs from 2008 to 2012 in English, French, Chinese, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish, the researchers found that the volume of stop-smoking queries was about 25 percent higher on Mondays than on the remaining days of the week combined. English language searches were about 11 percent higher on Mondays than on Wednesdays, about 67 percent higher than on Fridays, and about 145 percent greater on Mondays than on Saturdays.

The findings are important since researchers have previously thought that smokers’ impulse to quit smoking was random or chaotic, though some research did show that people wished to quit smoking on New Year’s Day when the interest in smoking cessation doubled. Nevertheless, New Year Day happens only once a year while there are 52 Mondays a year.

With the new insight, public health campaigns and smoking prevention efforts could then direct their resources including time, money, and staffing earlier in the week in order to get the best results. When people are actually paying attention and that measure of attention is certainly stronger. Monday is a day when people are more open to receiving information about health decisions and more likely to act on those decisions.

Meanwhile, one should not forget that social support plays an important role in helping people quit smoking. When one knows that he or she is not alone when reaching out for information can actually assist them follow-through on their intentions to quit.

Smokers might need many quit attempts before they can succeed. Hence, prompting them repeatedly on every Mondays might be an effective and easy way to implement campaign.

Neuroticism Might Lead to Heart Disease!

Neuroticism can be defined as an enduring tendency to experience negative emotional states. A neurotic person tends to experience negative feeling such as anger, anxiety, depression and guilt. People who are neurotic are worrisome and might have emotional vicissitudes. They simply could not respond to environmental stress appropriately and more likely to interpret ordinary situations as threatening and minor frustrations as hopelessly difficult.

In comparison, extroversion is the act, state, or habit of being predominantly concerned with and obtaining gratification from what is outside the self. Extroversive people are friendly and outgoing. They not only enjoy human interactions but also are enthusiastic, talkative, assertive and gregarious. A person, who is extroversive, is more likely to enjoy their time spent with people.

Researchers from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland reported in December 2007 in the Journal “Psychosomatic Medicine” that neuroticism could cause heart disease. To clarify the effects on heart by both neuroticism and extroversion, they looked at mortality in 5,424 middle-aged adults, who were followed for 21 years after they completed personality tests.

The findings revealed that an increasing degree of neuroticism was related to a higher risk of dying from any cause. However, the relationship disappeared after adjustments were made for other relevant factors like body weight, use of alcohol, social class and education. Furthermore, the risk of death from cardiovascular disease was higher when a person’s level of neuroticism rose. Such relationship was still significant even after statistical adjustment.

On the other hand, the researchers found that extraversion tended to reduce a person’s chance of dying from respiratory disease, although extraversion had no other effects on mortality.

In conclusion, the researchers believed that the link between neuroticism and death of cardiovascular disease could be related to gene, though the socioeconomic and behavioral factors should be included as well.

Exercise Can Help You Stay Healthy!

No matter how, you need to allocate certain amount of time to exercise! This is a piece of advice commonly recommended by or heard from doctors and health experts. However, how many of us will actually take such advice.

Ask yourself this question: when is your last exercise? Most of us will just quote excuses like ‘too busy’, ‘too tire’, and so on and so forth to skip exercise. We rather spend the spare time for watching television, playing computer games, or any other activities that require minimal or no physical movements at all.

A recent report published by the National Institute for Health and Medical Research (Inserm) on April 1, 2008 revealed that moderate, frequent exercise could reduce the risk of heart disease, diabetes, colon cancer, respiratory disease and depression.

In the report, the French researchers set a benchmark for adults, at least 30 minutes of modest exercise, such as fast walking, at least 5 times a week; or 20 minutes of harder exercise, such as jogging, 3 times a week. Young people should do twice that of the adults.

Furthermore, Inserm also recommended 'muscular strengthening' at least twice a week, and advised the elderly to do stretching and balance exercises.

Daily activities such as climbing up stairs with shopping bags or cleaning a bathroom can also be included in the exercise tally. However, Inserm cautioned that what the amount of exercise recommended would have only a minor effect on people who are obese.