why are teenagers attracted to smoking?

I think the media plays a significant role attracting vunerable teenagers into smoking as it glamorised using role models in films, associating smoking with positive images.

This image is of Michelle Pfeiffer in Scarface, in this film she is presented as sexy young woman always dressed well and frequently seen smoking . I believe this association attracts young girls to smoke, teenagers are easily influenced and woud like to copy their role models. Also, many artists such as Collie Budds and Snoop Dogg and many more specifically make songs centred round smoking canabis making canabis sound "cool" again influencing behaviur of teenagers.

Also, as i said before teenagers are likley to take more risk taking behaviour due to the state of their hormones, therefore they belive they are invincible and underestimate how easily they can become addicted to the substance. This doesn't only relate to smoking or drug taking but also unsafe sex and crime.

Here is a link showing how factors such as the media and peer pressure influence the decisions of young teenagers: http://students.umf.maine.edu/~sinaysm/tobacco%20paper.pdf