Smokers don't really want to wait until a major event like New Year's to quit. They'd rather just wait until Monday. Or at least begin their research.
According to a new study published in JAMA Internal Medicine on, well, Monday, Google browsers are 25 percent more likely to search terms like "quit smoking help" than any other day of the week, USA Today reported. Weekends appear to be the worst for quitting. Google searchers for the same terms were 145 percent less than on Mondays, USA Today reported.
"People see Mondays as a fresh start, a chance to get their acts together," said Morgan Johnson, research director for The Monday Campaigns, a not-for-profit organization that leads Monday-specific public health initiatives like "Meatless Mondays." Her organization backed the study when its own research found that traffic at the government website smokefree.gov peaked on the first work day of the week, USA Today reported.
Co-author Joanna Cohen, director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Global Tobacco Control, said the study's findings will be important in helping people who have tried to quit and failed by reinforcing the message, "If you relapse, you can try again next Monday." Cohen's research could also target those who use special events as a way to quit but fail to try otherwise, according to USA Today.
Tom Glynn, senior director of cancer science and trends at the American Cancer Society, Atlanta, supported Cohen's message.
"We always tell smokers that when they slip, it's not a failure, it's just part of the process," said Glynn, whose society sponsors the Great American Smokeout.
One in five adults smoke, the "largest single cause of preventable disease and early death in the United States," USA Today reported.
