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Dependence on smoking may be psychological as well as physical; the smoker misses whatever he gets from smoking but he does not really need it. Often, too, smoking has become such an ingrained habit that the smoker has a cigarette almost without knowing it. Some people smoke because they associate smoking with being sociable. To offer and to take cigarettes establishes a bond between people, and in this way it resembles food and drink. To the shy and introverted it offers something for them to do with their hands and makes them appear self-confident. The smoker may smoke as much to be one of the company, whether at work or at play, as to get any pleasure from it. The pleasure comes from ‘being with’ others and not from the cigarette.

The climate of opinion in which we live is an important factor in determining smoking. By and large, society is made for smokers, although this is changing. In our homes and in friend home’s, in cinemas and when traveling, we are surrounded by ashtrays, and it is assumed that we need and will use them. We are offered cigarettes, and the general assumption is that we do smoke, although this too is becoming much less common. Cigarette manufacturers offer inducements to smoke and their advertisements help to create the impression that smokers are ‘usual’ and non-smokers are unusual—and nobody wants to feel like the odd one out.