This study was performed to determine the smoking status and its associated factors in military life among young Korean men to provide date for smoking prevention in military areas as a part of the health promotion program for soldiers.

1,033 infantrymen serving in 17 military units, which are located in suburbs of K city, were enrolled in this study. A questionnaire on the soldiers smoking status and other various characteristics was obtained from October 2nd to 12th, 2000. Logistic regression analysis was performed on the various variables in order to determine the factors related to smoking.

1) 830(80.3%) out of 1033 subjects had smoked cigarettes and 759 persons(73.4%) were regular smokers. 2) Among the 734 soldiers who started smoking before their military service, 714 soldiers(97.2%) continued to smoke after, while 45 soldiers(15.0%) among the 299 non-smokers started smoking after joining the army. 3) Through the logistic regression analysis, the education level, specialty in the army, smoking amongst the friends they met before military service, smoking amongst soldiers in the army, dating girl friends, drinking, satisfaction with their army lives and the presence of convenient smoking places at the barracks were significant factors related to the prevalence of smoking in soldiers.

the factors related with incidence of smoking in the army are the complicated interactions among the individuals personal background, general charcterisitcs of the solider and the special environment in the barracks. Therefore, to improve national soldiers' health, an active non-smoking campaign and education should be pushed to discourage smoking in the barracks.