Channel 4 Programme Notes
PSHE - Up Close and Personal
Quit
Programme 2
Family Habit

Aims:

To raise awareness of:
 Synopsis:

The Quit series of five programmes has been designed to raise awareness of a range of issues surrounding cigarette smoking and legal controls on the use of tobacco. Using personal testimonies, the audience is introduced to the impact smoking has on people’s health and lifestyle. Smokers and non-smokers alike discuss how addiction to cigarettes has influenced their lives or those of their families. The series also focuses on how tobacco companies use marketing and advertising techniques to influence people’s smoking behaviour.

Programme 2: Family Habit
Meret and her mother talk about their respective smoking habits and the impact it has on other family members. The programme follows their attempts to stop smoking using a variety of techniques, including professional help.

00.00 – 04.40
Meret lives with her mother and brother. She started smoking at the age of 14. Her mother started at 15. Her brother hates the smell of smoke around the house. Both women want to stop smoking. They don’t like the smell of tobacco smoke on their hair, clothes and breath. They are also worried about stained teeth and damaging the skin on their faces.

The film tracks their progress as they both struggle to cope with some of the withdrawal symptoms people can experience when giving up smoking. Finding life intolerable without cigarettes, they are back puffing in days. They’d underestimated how much smoking was part of their lives and how addictive it really is. Mother feels a failure. Meret, determined to give up, seeks professional help.

Curriculum Relevance:

This programme has a major PSHE and citizenship focus with opportunities for cross-curricular work involving human biology, religious and moral education, English, drama and art. It has a locus in whole-school approaches to health and community development.

England & Wales

PSHE and Citizenship: Key Stage 4
National Healthy Schools Standard for Citizenship: Key Stage 4

Northern Ireland

Personal and Social Education Guidance for Key Stages 3 and 4
Social and Environmental Studies: Health and Drugs Education

Teachers should be aware of relevant guidelines for Key Stage 4 emerging from the Civic, Social and Political Education programme of study in the revised NI curriculum, which aims to prepare young people for participation in: Scotland

Scottish Executive: Guidance on Health Education, PSD, and Citizenship – middle to upper secondary stages.

Background Information:

Young people and smoking – current trends
 By the age of 16, two-thirds of young people have experimented with smoking. In 2002, 26% of girls and 21% of boys in the 11–15 age range were regular smokers in England. While the trend has varied up and down over the last twenty years, this represents a slightly downwards trend but still more girls smoking than boys.

 Starting smoking – what influences young people?
 Research evidence suggests young people are three times more likely to smoke if both parents smoke. Parents disapproving of them smoking contributes to non-smoking behaviour. Young people tend to smoke heavily promoted brands and brands popular with the groups they hang out with. The latter tends to be more to do with peer identification. For those influenced by smoking behaviour of friends, this appears more a ‘joining in’ thing than to do with peer pressure. Advertising can have the effect of suggesting that smoking is a socially accepted norm and sports sponsorship in particular has been shown to increase brand awareness among young people. (See also Quit: A Breath of Fresh Air in this series.)

 Withdrawal symptoms – are they real?
 The body quickly becomes dependent on nicotine and adapts to the effects of the chemicals within tobacco smoke. When people stop smoking they can experience a range of withdrawal symptoms: drop in pulse rate; drop in blood pressure; sleep disturbance; slower reactions; tension; restlessness; depression; irritability; constipation; difficulty in concentration and a craving for tobacco.

 Do young people really become addicted so quickly?
 Young people who experiment with cigarettes quickly become addicted to nicotine in tobacco. A survey of young people aged 11–16 who smoked found they had similar levels of nicotine dependence as adults. The same survey also found that one-third of those smoking one or more cigarettes a week were smoking their first cigarette within 30 minutes of waking up. Over half of regular smokers said they’d found it difficult to give up for a week and 72% thought it would be difficult to give up altogether. During periods of abstinence young people experience withdrawal symptoms similar to those experienced by adults.

 Women and smoking
 Women who smoke have more reproductive tract infections, more fertility and menstrual disorders and an earlier menopause. During pregnancy there is a greater risk of premature detachment of the placenta. Once detachment has occurred, perinatal death rates also increase.

Activities:

Before viewing
 Tell the students they are going to see one of a series of short films focusing on issues around smoking and tobacco control.

 After viewing
 Key questions:
a) What message/s was the film trying to get across?
b) What techniques were employed to do this?
c) How successful did individuals feel this was?
d) What impact had the film made on them personally?
e) How did they feel about what the characters were going through?
f) Has it made them think about anything to do with smoking in a different way?
Activity 1
 1. Tell the students you want them to look at the film again and afterwards discuss:
a) Is there anything Meret and her mother could have done to help themselves give up?
b) Is there anything other people could have done to help them?
2. Talk about the effects of withdrawal they see the two people experiencing. Can they explain them? (See background to A Hole In My Neck.) Are there other withdrawal symptoms they know of?

3. Ask them to draw up a plan of action for Meret and her mother to help them successfully stop smoking.

 Activity 2
 Brainstorm in groups, or as a class, things that might motivate people to stop smoking. Write these on the board, grouping them into appropriate categories. Ask the class, if they were smokers, which motivators would encourage them to stop. Discuss responses and any differences of opinion. Were there any gender differences?

What were the motivating factors for Meret and her mother? In what ways might mother and daughter be under different pressures? Ask students how they would feel if they had a 9 year old who was experimenting with smoking. How would they feel if it was a 14 year old? How would they handle the two situations?

Links:

This web page contains links to other websites that are neither controlled nor maintained by Channel 4 Television. Channel 4 Television is not responsible for the content of these sites and does not necessarily endorse the material on them.

www.givingupsmoking.co.uk

Wide range of information and support to help people stop smoking and stay stopped. Has a section on young people and smoking.

www.ash.org.uk

Website of the campaign group Action on Smoking and Health (ASH). Contains sections on all aspects of tobacco control including passive smoking. Has wide-ranging statistics and summaries of recent research.

Quit: Programme 1: A Hole in my Neck
Credits:

Produced and directed by Emma Wakefield

Thanks to Queen's Medical Centre, Nottingham

Graphics: INTRO
Camera: Tony Etwell
Sound: Trevor Hunter
Dubbing Mixer: Cliff Jones
Online Editors: Stuart Highsted and Ian Moffat
Music: Andrew Phillips
Production Manager: Isabelle Pavitt
Editor: Maggie Knox
Production Co-ordinator: Katie Vincent
Programme Notes: Iain Ramsay
Research: Sally Ashby



 Quit: Programme 2: Hole in my Neck
Credits:

Produced and directed by Emma Wakefield

Thanks to Barracuda Group

Filmed by Pam and Meret Stokes
Graphics: INTRO
Sound: Trevor Hunter
Dubbing Mixer: Cliff Jones
Online Editors: Stuart Highsted and Ian Moffat
Music: Andrew Phillips
Production Manager: Isabelle Pavitt
Editor: Maggie Knox
Production Co-ordinator: Katie Vincent
Programme Notes: Iain Ramsay
Research: Sally Ashby



 Quit: Programme 3: Greg’s Story
Credits:

Produced and directed by Lisa Fairbank

Thanks to the Caterer family

Graphics: INTRO
Camera: Ian Moss
Sound: Billy Quinn
Dubbing Mixer: Cliff Jones
Online Editors: Stuart Highsted and Ian Moffat
Music: Andrew Phillips
Production Manager: Isabelle Pavitt
Editor: Maggie Knox
Production Co-ordinator: Katie Vincent
Programme Notes: Iain Ramsay
Research: Sally Ashby



 Quit: Programme 4: A Breath of Fresh Air
Credits:

Produced and directed by Emma Wakefield

Thanks to Queen’s Medical Centre, Nottingham

Archive

BBC Television
CBS News
Film Images
ITN Archive

Graphics: INTRO
Camera: Tony Etwell
Sound: Trevor Hunter
Dubbing Mixer: Cliff Jones
Online Editors: Stuart Highsted and Ian Moffat
Music: Andrew Phillips
Production Manager: Isabelle Pavitt
Editor: Maggie Knox
Production Co-ordinator: Katie Vincent
Programme Notes: Iain Ramsay
Research: Sally Ashby



 Quit: Programme 5: Dog End
Credits:

Produced and directed by Emma Wakefield

Music: Barney Quinton
Thanks to Rachel Tillotson and Claire Underwood
Animated by Sandra Ensby
Programme Notes: Iain Ramsay