The Tobacco Control has published a research paper indicating that teens who smoke just one cigarette at the age of 11 are twice as likely to take up a regular smoking habit in the later teen years than peers who do not experiment with smoking at the same age.

Based on an observational study of young teens in South London, researchers state that their findings provide the first clear evidence of a sleeper effect or period of dormant vulnerability for teenagers who experiment with smoking just one time. It seems just one cigarette rewards a pathway in the brain that is then activated a few years down the road by stress factors, depression or the social pressures typical in a school environment.

The results of the study sound eerily familiar to the way heroin addiction is described, and when I first read it, that is what I kept thinking they were talking about -- heroin addiction. Nicotine is as powerful as heroine in grabbing hold on the user in what becomes a life-long struggle to escape. Available as a PDF document, the research paper is available here.