Reducing Prenatal Smoking: What Role Can State Policies Play?

The researchers used the Pregnancy Risk-Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS) data from more than 25 states for at least three years, supplemented with data on state regulatory and tobacco control policies to examine the variation in maternal smoking and to identify: (1) what socio-demographic characteristics of women affect variation in maternal smoking across states, (2) what state policies or characteristics affect the variation in maternal smoking across states, (3) how much of the overall variation is explained by state policy versus variation in the socio-demographic differences of maternal populations, and (4) whether the impacts of state policy and individual characteristics on prevalence levels differ from their impacts on changes in behavior (e.g. quits or relapses)? The objective of this project was to identify the impact of state policies on smoking prevalence in maternal populations.