Chapter 1 14 success. Stress due to material conditions, or the lack of those, makes it harder to focus on the future. Immediate pressing issues take up the mental bandwidth to think about long term effects of (unhealthy) decisions. Economists refer to this prioritization of the immediate future over the distant future as delay discounting, or a reduced temporal horizon.32 Providing short-term rewards or incentives can help overcome this bias and make quitting more attractive. Delay discounting often presents in individuals with high stress levels. Another aspect of higher stress levels can be reduced cognitive bandwidth. According to Mullainathan and Safir’s theory of scarcity, stress can limit one’s cognitive bandwidth, limiting the mental capacity need to make deliberate and undeliberate (healthy) choices.34 Tackling the sources of stress in tobacco users’ lives may have potential to increase this cognitive bandwidth and improve the success rate of cessation programmes. Towards a smoke-free generation To further reduce the negative impact of tobacco use in society there is thus a need to explore additional strategies to protect and prevent youth from smoking and to improve success rates of quit attempts among those who currently smoke. This thesis will investigate novel approaches for both these aspects in order to contribute to a smoke-free generation Aims of this thesis: In this thesis, I aim to investigate strategies to phase out tobacco use by focussing on protecting against and preventing smoking, as well as on improving quit attempts among current tobacco users. The two key objectives are: • To evaluate public support for and implementation aspects of smoke-free policies in public outdoor and (semi)private places (part I) • To investigate new approaches to improve smoking cessation programmes using personalisation and financial incentives (part II) Outline In order to inform policies aimed at protecting people against the harms of second-hand smoke exposure and decreasing future trends in tobacco use this thesis will investigate smoke-free policies that go beyond indoor public places and workplaces (Part I) and we investigate strategies to incorporate personal
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