title: Differences in spousal influence on smoking cessation by gender and education among Japanese couples.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Previous studies have reported that spousal non-smoking has a spillover effect on the partner's cessation. However, discussion is lacking on the factors modifying that association. We examined whether the spillover effect of spousal non-smoking was associated with the couple's educational attainment.
  
  
  METHODS
  We used paired marital data from the Japanese Study on Stratification, Health, Income, and Neighborhood (J-SHINE), which targeted residents aged 25-50 years in four Japanese municipalities. We selected a spouse smoker at the time of marriage (target respondent), and set his/her smoking status change (continued or quit smoking after marriage) as an outcome, regressed on the counterpart's smoking status (continued smoking or non-smoking) and combinations of each couple's educational attainment as explanatory variables using log-binomial regression models (n =1001 targets; 708 men and 293 women).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Regression results showed that a counterpart who previously quit smoking or was a never-smoker was associated with the target male spouse's subsequent cessation. However, for women, the association between husband's non-smoking and their own cessation was significant only for couples in which both spouses were highly educated.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our findings suggest that a spouse's smoking status is important for smoking cessation interventions in men. For women, however, a couple's combined educational attainment may matter in the interventions.
authors.affiliation: Department of Health and Social Behavior, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan. dtakagi-utokyo@umin.ac.jp.
authors.forename: Daisuke
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Takagi
authors.forename: Naoki
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kondo
authors.forename: Misato
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Takada
authors.forename: Hideki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hashimoto
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D044466:Asian People; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007564:Japan / Q000453:epidemiology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D012737:Sex Factors; D012907:Smoking / Q000453:epidemiology*; D016540:Smoking Cessation / Q000523:psychology*; D000074606:Smoking Prevention; D012944:Social Support; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D018454:Spouses