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Journal of Health Psychology
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Accounts of Quitting among Older Ex-smokers with Smoking-related Disease

O. Parry

F. G. R. Fowkes

University of Edinburgh, UK

C. Thomson

Department of Public Health, Edinburgh, UK

This article uses a discourse analytic method to explore how a sample of ex-smokers with smoking-related illness position themselves, and are positioned by, the language they use in their accounts of quitting. The article suggests that discursive constructions (having ‘no choice’ and getting ‘another chance’) used by the respondents position them in a way that constrains behaviour by closing down the option of smoking and/or opening up the possibility of change. In each telling, the respondents' (non-smoking) identities are confirmed anew and this affirmation may assist in sustaining the change and provide protection against relapse. Moreover, the article suggests that the development and exchange of these stories may contribute to the growth of shared beliefs about the experience of quitting, opening up the option of quitting for current smokers. In so doing, accounts of quitting provided by ex-smokers undermine or resist dominant social understandings that even among those highly motivated to stop smoking, quitting is a difficult, if not impossible, endeavour.

Key Words: discourse analysis • older people • qualitative • smoking cessation

Journal of Health Psychology, Vol. 6, No. 5, 481-493 (2001)
DOI: 10.1177/135910530100600502
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