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The effect of cigarette prices on smoking cessation in South Africa using duration analysis: 1970–2017

2025· article· en· W4406943768 on OpenAlexafffund
Nicole Vellios, Corné van Walbeek, G. Emmanuel Guindon

Bibliographic record

VenueSocial Science & Medicine · 2025
Typearticle
Languageen
FieldEnvironmental Science
TopicAir Quality and Health Impacts
Canadian institutionsMcMaster University
FundersAfrican Capacity Building FoundationInternational Development Research CentreBill and Melinda Gates Foundation
KeywordsDuration (music)Smoking cessationMedicineCigarette smokingDemographyEnvironmental healthSociologyInternal medicineArt

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

South Africa is an interesting case to explore given its high smoking rates and quit intentions, its experience with periods of tax- and industry-initiated cigarette price increases, and the mixed evidence of the effect of prices on smoking cessation (particularly in low- and middle-income countries). We used data from five waves of the National Income Dynamics Study, a nationally-representative survey conducted between 2008 and 2017, and duration analysis techniques to examine whether cigarette prices were associated with South African smokers' decision to quit smoking. Smoking histories were constructed from self-reported age of onset and cessation and matched to monthly price data from 1970 to 2017. We found that price was associated with smoking cessation: a 10% increase in the price of cigarettes was associated with an increase in smoking cessation of 5.8-7.9%, depending on model specification. Our results indicate that increasing the excise tax on cigarettes above inflation would likely encourage smoking cessation in South Africa, provided measures to reduce illicit cigarette trade are concurrently implemented.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame machine prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.001
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.006
Version: metacan-v3-hybrid-931329e0061cValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Observational · Consensus signal: Observational
GenreCandidate signal: Empirical · Consensus signal: Empirical
Teacher disagreement score0.063
Threshold uncertainty score0.126

Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0010.006
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0000.000
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0000.001
Bibliometrics0.0010.002
Science and technology studies0.0000.000
Scholarly communication0.0010.001
Open science0.0000.001
Research integrity0.0000.001
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0030.000

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.042
GPT teacher head0.365
Teacher spread0.323 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designObservational
Domainnot available
GenreEmpirical

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations3
Published2025
Admission routes2
Has abstractyes

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