Dr Fran O'Callaghan of Griffith University's Psychological Health Research
Centre, and colleagues from the Mater Hospital and the University of Queensland,
looked at about 4500 children of mothers in a long-term study.
Smoking during late pregnancy and continued smoking as the children grew up
influenced smoking in teenagers, Dr O'Callaghan said.
While smoking was in part a learned behaviour, the results suggested maternal
smoking during pregnancy had a direct biological effect on the foetal brain.
Also, the likelihood of teens taking up smoking could be assessed from as
early as five and predicted by looking at a range of problems.
"We looked at various risk factors at the age of five (including)
family, social and child risk factors," Dr O'Callaghan said.
"Some of the ones that were significant were maternal smoking and
alcohol use, being unmarried, having a partner who had ever been arrested,
having four or more children in the household and child aggression at five
years."
Dr O'Callaghan said the findings identified warning signs that a child was
likely to take up smoking as a teenager.
"For instance a GP dealing with a mother who experiences these risk
factors, will be alerted to future vulnerability."
The findings also reinforce the dangers of smoking during pregnancy.
"(They) should be an incentive for women who are currently smoking to
stop smoking and for young girls not to take it up because there are long term
consequences.
"I suppose a lot of people think that smoking during pregnancy just
leads to lower birthweight babies, but there are lots of other effects as
well," she said.
The study, published in the latest edition of the journal Addiction,
was funded by a grant from the National Health and Medical Research Council.
AAP smb/jt/bwl
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