Depressive Symptoms and Smoking Cessation Success at 12-Month Follow-Up After a Smoking Cessation Treatment: The Moderating Role of Past Quit Attempts.

Background: Previous research indicated that having made previous quit attempts increased the likelihood of achieving smoking cessation, and that people with depressive symptoms have more difficulties in quitting smoking. However, how previous quit attempts may affect the relationship between depressive symptoms and long-term smoking cessation has not been studied. This study aims to investigate the interactive effect of previous quit attempts in the relationship between depressive symptoms and cessation at the 12-month follow-up after a psychological intervention for smoking cessation.

Methods: The sample comprised 509 participants who smoked (M_age = 45.35, 61.7% female) requesting treatment to quit smoking. Depressive symptoms were assessed at baseline using the Beck Depression Inventory-II. Participants who did not smoke in the previous 30 days were considered to have quit smoking at the 12-month follow-up.

Results: Regression analyses showed a significant interaction between depressive symptoms and previous quit attempts. Concretely, those participants with higher depressive symptoms and no previous quit experiences were less likely to report quitting at 12-month follow-up compared to those who reported two or more previous quit attempts (OR = 0.45, P = .016). These findings were confirmed by stratified regression models, which showed that depressive symptoms were significantly negatively associated with cessation only among those participants without previous quit attempts (OR = 0.43, P = .004).

Conclusion: Findings of the present study suggest that not having previous experience in quitting smoking may impact the relationship between depressive symptoms and long-term cessation in seeking-treatment people who smoke. These findings could be used in clinical practice to improve long-term smoking cessation success.