Week 9: Analyzing My Survey

Hey, everyone! Welcome to my Senior Project blog for Week 9. This week I was analyzing the results from my survey, and I will be sharing some of my findings.

Online, I had 67 responses from people aged 12-18, 8 responses from people aged 19-24, 12 responses from people aged 25-39, 4 responses from people aged 40-60, and 1 response from people aged 60+. In person, I had 2 responses from people aged 12-18, 2 responses from people aged 19-24, 3 responses from people aged 25-39, 8 responses from people aged 40-60, and 4 responses from people aged 60+.

32 respondents reported having used a tobacco product before. The amount of people who had reported using each type of tobacco product was 50% for cigarettes, 12.5% for cigarette tobacco, about 9.4% for roll-your-own tobacco, about 9.4% for smokeless tobacco, around 53.1% for electronic cigarettes/vapes, 25% for cigars, 25% for hookahs, 6.25% for nicotine gels, 6.25% for nicotine pouches, around 3.1% for dissolvables, and none for pipe tobacco.

12 respondents reported being current users. Of these 12, 7 said tobacco product usage has a positive impact on their life, 5 said they would like to quit, and 6 said a doctor has recommended them to quit. 7 of the current users answered the adult mental health questions while 5 answered the under 18 questions. In order to analyze my responses, I used The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) by the American Psychiatric Association, which is where I got my survey questions from. I found that, out of the adults, 6 showed symptoms of anxiety and 4 showed symptoms of depression. Out of the children, 4 showed symptoms of anxiety and 1 showed symptoms of depression. This shows that most of the tobacco product users who took my survey showed symptoms of a mental disorder. 

All my respondents were asked to answer questions about their beliefs on tobacco products and 40% of respondents said they reduce stress, 32% said they reduce anxiety, 14% said they help with depression, 61% said they increase stress, 68% said they increase anxiety, and 63% said they worsen depression. While most people did say they believe tobacco products have a negative impact on mental health, people who had used tobacco products or are current users were more likely to say that tobacco products help alleviate these mental disorders.

It’s been so exciting analyzing the results of my survey, which has been going on for about 6 weeks. My findings mostly support the idea that people might use tobacco products because of mental disorders, and I can’t wait to include my results when presenting all my research. Next week, I will be finishing my posters and presentation. See you all in my next post!