Relationships between self-esteem,personality and smoking behavior among high school students in Xi’an city

Objective To understand smoking situation and the relationship between smoking behavior and selfesteem,personality among high school students and to provide basis for prevention and treatment of smoking behavior.Methods A questionnaire survey was conducted among 691 high school students in grade ten and grade twelve from 4 schools in Xi'an city.The relationship between smoking behavior and personality was investigated.Results The smoking rate was 39.8% in the students(86.9% for male and 13.1% for female),with a significant gender difference.Self-esteem, nerves and neuroticism were related to smoking among the male and smoking was related to self-esteem among the female.Conclusion Smoking behavior is closely related to self-esteem and personality factors among high school students.