The theory of planned behavior applied to cigarette smoking in African-American, Puerto Rican, and non-Hispanic white teenage females.

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the adequacy of Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behavior to predict cigarette-smoking intention in three groups of teenage females. Participants were 141 African-Americans, 146 Puerto Ricans, and 143 non-Hispanic whites, 13 to 19 years of age. Consistent with the Theory of Planned Behavior, path analysis revealed direct relationships among attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, and smoking intention for African-Americans. For Puerto Ricans and non-Hispanic whites, only the relationships among attitude, perceived behavioral control, and smoking intention were supported. Subjective norm was not found to be a significant predictor of smoking intention for these two groups. The results suggest that the Theory of Planned Behavior provides an empirically adequate explanation of cigarette smoking among female African-American teenage women.