Do you want to successfully quit smoking? Then it is especially important whether you can see yourself as a non-smoker. Psychologist Eline Meijer has also discovered that quit smokers who fail to do so have a greater chance of relapse. This is more common in smokers with a lower socioeconomic background.
‘People prefer to behave in a way that suits their identity,’ explains psychologist Meijer. “For some smokers, smoking is an important part of who they are. Smoking really suits how they see themselves. Others see themselves as non-smokers. Smokers who can see themselves as non-smokers are more likely to quit. That new identity as a non-smoker is actually a 'future self'. We know that a clear picture of the 'future self' can be very motivating for behavioral change.”
Meijer has combined different methods in her PhD research. In a small-scale study, ten people who wanted to quit smoking were interviewed over a three-month period. The researchers obtained data on the identity of smokers and quitters from an existing large-scale study of six years. Meijer:'The main advantage of the large dataset was that we could follow people over a long period of time. This enabled us to properly investigate whether and how identity changes. And also whether there are differences based on socio-economic status.' The researchers also used questionnaires, asking whether the smokers had quit or not a year later. The results point in the same direction. The lower educated have more difficulty with a non-smoker identity. They see themselves more strongly as a smoker, but less easily as a non-smoker.
