Definitions for the Canadian Student Tobacco, Alcohol and Drugs Survey 2014-15 

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Current smoker

Has smoked at least 100 cigarettes in his/her lifetime, and includes the following:

  1. Current daily - a current smoker who has smoked at least one cigarette per day for each of the 30 days preceding the survey.
  2. Current occasional - a current smoker who has smoked at least one cigarette during the past 30 days, but has not smoked every day
Former smoker
Smoked at least 100 cigarettes in his/her lifetime and has not smoked at all during the past 30 days.
Experimental smoker
Has smoked at least one whole cigarette, has not smoked 100 or more cigarettes in his/her lifetime and has smoked in the last 30 days.
Former experimental smoker
Has smoked at least one whole cigarette, has not smoked 100 or more cigarettes in his/her lifetime and has not smoked at all in the past 30 days.
Puffer
Someone who has just tried a few puffs of a cigarette, but has never smoked a whole cigarette.
Ever tried a cigarette
Someone who has ever tried a cigarette, even a few puffs.
Never tried a cigarette
Someone who has never tried a cigarette, not even a few puffs.
Prevalence of smoking
The proportion of cigarette smokers in the target population.
Amount smoked
The average number of cigarettes smoked per day by daily smokers.
Social sources of cigarettes
Family/friend/someone gives them / take from family member / buy from friend or someone else / ask someone to buy them.
95% confidence interval
This provides a range of values in which the estimated prevalence will fall 95% of the time (i.e., if the survey was repeated 20 times, the results would fall within this range 19 of those times, or 19 times out of 20).

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