Smoking as a coping mechanism for depressive mood: exploring the influence of obesity in adults – a cross-sectional study

Background
Obesity is recognized as one of the main causes of many health problems and is known to contribute to the development of depressive moods.

Objectives
This study aimed to investigate the likelihood of adult individuals adopting smoking behavior to cope with depressive mood and the effect of the presence of obesity on this situation.

Material and methods
In this cross-sectional study conducted from March 2022 to April 2022, a total of 343 participants were included. A 33-item questionnaire was administered to assess the socio-demographic characteristics of the study participants. To evaluate depression among participants, the Beck Depression Inventory for Primary Care (BDI-PC) was employed. Additionally, the Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence was used to assess smoking behavior and nicotine dependence levels. Statistical analysis of the collected data was carried out using the SPSS Statistics 21 program, with statistical significance set at p < 0.05.

Results
61% of the participants were female, and 39% were male. The mean age of our population was 44.3 ± 0.85 years. In our study, no significant association was found between body mass index (BMI) and depression status (p = 0.188). However, when we compared BMI with smoking addiction, there was a statistically significant association between the two (p = 0.002). When we compared depression status and smoking addiction, no significant association was found (p = 0.727).

Conclusions
Our study findings reveal a significant link between BMI and smoking addiction; however, there was no significant link between BMI and depression nor between depression and smoking addiction.