Health Behavior Risk and the Population Health Model

Background on Tobacco Consumption in Emerging Adults

Tobacco use continues to be a significant public health concern, with high prevalence in emerging adults between 18 and 29 years of age. Emerging adults have high vulnerability to social factors, marketing, and ease of access to nicotine-containing products. As of 2021, 13.3% of US adults between 18 and 24 have ever used a cigarette, and 16.5% of young adults have ever used an electronic cigarette (Erhabor et al., 2023): Health Behavior Risk and the Population Health Model.

With electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDs), the face of tobacco use has changed, with social trends and flavorful items driving use. Long-term use consequences include cardiovascular disease, chronic disease, and increased cancer risks. Tobacco use in emerging adults must be addressed in an attempt to inhibit long-term complications and lessen public health consequences.

Detailed Plan Describing the Use of the Population Health Model

A strategic intervention with a population model for managing emerging adults and cigarette use must involve individual, community, and policy interventions. Individual-level interventions involve smoking cessation programs, electronic health interventions, and medical care provider counseling for individuals who are trying to quit smoking. Community-level interventions, such as smoke-free campus policies and public information programs, promote an environment that disapproves and reduces cigarette use.

Policy-level interventions, such as increased taxes for tobacco, a ban on flavored nicotine, and restrictions on advertisement, make cigarette use less accessible and less desirable (Bafunno et al., 2020). Overall, intervention produces long-term, sustained decreases in cigarette use and long-term improvements in health.

Downstream Approach to Address the Changes Needed

The downstream model targets persons who use tobacco, with a focus placed on cessation interventions. Behavior therapy and medications such as NRT have effectively enhanced cessation activity. Computerized interventions, such as smartphone programs and SMS-delivered programs for smoking cessation, have been seen to have increased success in terms of getting youth and emerging adults to quit smoking. In studies, persons utilizing computerized cessation aids have a 50% chance of successful cessation compared to persons attempting to stop unaided (Fekom et al., 2022).

Integrating routine tobacco screening and cessation counseling in general practice settings maximizes access to service delivery. Further, emerging adults respond positively to individualized quit planning, motivational interviewing, and follow-up, and these interventions promote long-term abstinence success.

Midstream Approach to Address the Changes Needed

Midstream interventions involve altering social and community environments to discourage cigarette use. Adoption of smoke-free policies in college, workplace, and social settings is a successful intervention. College campuses, where many emerging adults spend much time, have successfully reduced cigarette use through widespread campus programs of tobacco freedom; at the same time, schools with no-smoking policies have fewer students starting cigarette use (Berg et al., 2020). Having access to free and reduced-cost cessation programs in community settings is a significant intervention in cigarette addiction reduction.

Peer-facilitated cessation programs and peer groups support each other in cessation work to develop additional smoke cessation interventions, with social networks having a decisive role in shaping cigarette use behavior (Onwuzo et al., 2024). Awareness is raised, and healthy behavior is encouraged through community educational programs and educational workshops about the risks of cigarette and electronic cigarette use.

Upstream Approach to Address the Needed Changes

Upstream interventions address overall policy changes that affect tobacco use at a population level. Tobacco price rise has been one of the most effective strategies in controlling youth and young adults’ use of cigarette smoke. According to Friedman and Pesko (2022), a rise in cigarette prices of $1 lowered youth and young adults’ use of cigarette smoke by 3%. Similarly, a sales restriction of flavored tobacco products, including mentholated cigarettes and flavored electronic cigarettes, reduces the initiation of the use of tobacco in emerging adults immensely.

Promotion of tobacco products through social and electronic platforms tends to normalize the use of tobacco in youth. Enforcement of stricter advertisement laws, including a restriction on the advertisement of tobacco products on electronic platforms, can effectively reduce contact with pro-smoking messages. Besides, an expansion in Medicaid for programs for cessation of cigarette smoke helps in eradicating financial barriers to accessing programs for cessation, and a more significant proportion of youth and young adults can access programs for cessation of use of cigarette smoke.

Effectiveness of the Three Strategies

A comprehensive, multi-strategic intervention that incorporates both downstream, midstream and upstream approaches maximizes impact for tobacco cessation in emerging adults. Individual interventions, such as behavior therapy and electronic cessation aids, impart direct intervention to individuals actively working towards cessation of smoking. Individual interventions have been proven to have a high impact on enhancing long-term cessation of smoking (Onwuzo et al., 2024). Community interventions, such as smoke-free campus settings and peer-support groups, make settings less supportive for initiation and more straightforward for individuals to cease smoking.

Young adults have been proven less likely to initiate and less likely to have a relapse when in a supportive, smoke-free environment, according to studies (Weng et al., 2025). Policy interventions, such as taxes and bans on marketing, effectively restrict access and demand for tobacco in emerging adults. Having a multi-strategic intervention ensures that interventions for the use of tobacco address both behavioral, environmental, and systemic factors driving use and, in doing so, promote long-term improvements in health at a population level.

Conclusively, tobacco use in emerging adults requires a complex, multi-level intervention. Individual-level programs for cessation, community-level interventions, and policies make a multi-faceted intervention to stop smoking prevalence. Empowering emerging adults with an environment, settings, and policies helps prevent initiation and long-term abstinence from tobacco use. Interventions at all three levels bring a long-term, sustained impact in reduced tobacco use, improving future generations’ public health profiles.

References

Bafunno, D., Catino, A., Lamorgese, V., Bene, G. D., Longo, V., Montrone, M., Pesola, F., Pizzutilo, P., Cassiano, S., Mastrandrea, A., Ricci, D., Petrillo, P., Varesano, N., Zacheo, A., & Galetta, D. (2020). A systematic review of the impact of tobacco control interventions on smoking initiation, cessation, and prevalence. Journal of Thoracic Disease, 12(7). https://doi.org/10.21037/jtd.2020.02.23

Berg, C. J., Yang, Y. T., Pratt-Chapman, M. L., Douglas Evans, W., Cupertino, A.-P., Horn, K., Bernat, D. H., Abroms, L. C., & Tercyak, K. P. (2020). Campus tobacco control policies and cessation interventions in college students: a commentary calling for research and action to address tobacco-related health disparities. Translational Behavioral Medicine, 11(4). https://doi.org/10.1093/tbm/ibaa083

Erhabor, J., Boakye, E., Obisesan, O. H., Osei, A. D., Erfan Tasdighi, M., H., D., A. P., Stokes, A., Hirsch, G. A., Benjamin, E. J., Rodríguez, C. J., El-Shahawy, O., Rose Marie Robertson, Bhatnagar, A., & Blaha, M. (2023). E-Cigarette Use Among US Adults in the 2021 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Survey. JAMA Network Open, 6(11), e2340859–e2340859. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.40859

Fekom, M., Tarik El Aarbaoui, Guignard, R., Andler, R., Guillemette Quatremère, Ducarroz, S., Viêt Nguyen-Thanh, & Melchior, M. (2022). Use of tobacco cessation aids and likelihood of smoking cessation: A French population-based study. 30, 102044–102044. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pmedr.2022.102044

Friedman, A. S., & Pesko, M. F. (2022). Young Adult Responses to Taxes on Cigarettes and Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems. Addiction, 117(12). https://doi.org/10.1111/add.16002

Onwuzo, C. N., Olukorode, J., Sange, W., Orimoloye, D. A., Udojike, C., Omoragbon, L., Hassan, A. E., Falade, D. M., Omiko, R., Odunaike, O. S., Adams-Momoh, P. A., Addeh, E., Onwuzo, S., & Joseph-Erameh, U. (2024). A Review of Smoking Cessation Interventions: Efficacy, Strategies for Implementation, and Future Directions. Cureus, 16(1). https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.52102

Weng, X., Yang, H., Song, C., Tu, J., Liu, K., & Wang, M. P. (2025). Engaging and supporting young adults in smoking cessation: Insights from a mobile-based cessation program in China. Digital Health, 11. https://doi.org/10.1177/20552076241311055

ORDER A PLAGIARISM-FREE PAPER HERE

We’ll write everything from scratch

Module 3 Assignment- Concise paper on Health Behavior Risk and the Population Health Model
Paper instructions:
Please review Chapters 5, 6, and 7 in the Knickman and Elbel text.

This concise paper will focus on one health behavior risk using McKinlay’s population-based intervention model.

Choose one of the following behavioral risk factors: tobacco use, alcohol/substance use, physical activity, diet/nutrition, or obesity.

Provide background information and statistical data on your chosen topic for the emerging adult population (ages 18 to 29).

Develop a detailed plan describing use of the population health model to address the specific behavioral risk factor for a population of emerging adults.

Health Behavior Risk and the Population Health Model

Be sure to discuss a minimum of three strategies/approaches (downstream, midstream, and upstream) to address the changes needed with your chosen health risk factor.

State two specific reasons (backed by scholarly sources) why these three strategies would be appropriate and effective with changing health behaviors among emerging adults.

Concise Paper Guidelines:

• Please address all of the required items above in your paper.
• Follow correct 7th edition APA formatting.
• Support your writing with at least two scholarly sources (one can be your textbook). Remember, quotes are not allowed with assignments in this course.
• The page limit for this paper is a minimum of two (2) pages with a maximum allowed of four (4) pages- please note that this page limit relates to the content only. The title and reference pages are not included in the specified page limit but are required for this assignment.
• Please review the grading rubric.