If you’re trying to quit smoking you’ll pretty much try anything to kick the habit.
Chewing nicotine gum, plastering yourself with patches, downing a pint of water every time you have a craving or just harshing it out cold turkey.
There’s even evidence that this mindfulness mind trick can boost your chances of quitting.
But if you’re aching to give up the cancer sticks then a new study has found there’s one method that will dent your hopes of going smoke free.
Research shows that your partner/mum/boss/asthmatic friend nagging at you to stub out the cigs will only make it worse.
While they probably think that twisting your arm and bending your ear will cajole you on your way to being smoke free, it actually has the opposite effect.
It’s more likely to make you want to run down to the nearest garage, buy a 20 deck and spark them all up at once, according to the study from the University of Aberdeen.
Instead the researchers, who studied 100 couples with one smoker and one none smoker, suggest a different approach.
Scientists say that a little gentle emotional encouragement and practical support is far more effective.
Study author Dr Gertraud Stadler said:
“According to this study, the smoker’s chance of stopping smoking would increase if we can train the partners to give more tailored support according to the smokers’ habits.
“The whole idea behind these studies was to really understand what happens on a day to day basis when one partner quits smoking and importantly, what the other can do to help them.
“We asked couples to keep diaries ten days before the smoker tried to quit and for 21 days after. This meant we could look at whether quitting success differs whether the non-smoking partner provides support beforehand or after the quit date.
“We found that support was most beneficial when given after the quit date. This makes sense given that this was when the help was really needed.
“We know that there are many things that are not helpful in stopping smoking – such as nagging or trying to control the situation.
“These results show that we should encourage the partner to offer emotional support as well as practical help like taking care of the kids. There are lots of things that partners can do to help their significant others quit.”
So this might include helping them out with the shopping, looking after the kids and keeping everything stress free.
