Reducing Smoking with Financial Incentives in East Timor (2025-2026)
Please note that this was a joint Duke-DKU team that included faculty and students from both institutions. Initially planning to examine to tobacco control efforts in East Timor, this team pivoted to China due to logistical constraints.
China is the world’s largest producer and consumer of tobacco. It is estimated that more than 50% of males aged 15 years and older are current tobacco users. Tobacco control in China is limited, but efforts to reduce smoking are gaining momentum. However, most interventions to reduce tobacco usage have thus far focused on education about health risks, with results showing limited effectiveness.
This project team explored different pathways to reduce smoking in China and globally: (1) testing financial incentives for tobacco abstinence; (2) estimating the environmental footprint of smoking behavior; (3) examining whether financial incentives buffer the withdrawal symptoms of smoking cessation; (4) uncovering how schools have been neglected as venues for tobacco control and (5) mapping the state of research about workplace-based interventions for smoking cessation.
Team members conducted systematic reviews, informal interviews, pilot field studies and wrote research papers to examine the efficacy of financial incentives as deterrents to smoking and other addictive behaviors.
Timing
Fall 2025 – Spring 2026
Team Outputs
Pilot field study
Informal interviews
Environmental Impact of the Economic Cost of Smoking (Draft of research paper)
Systematic review of financial incentives to reduce smoking
Systematic review of school-based tobacco interventions
Reducing Smoking with Financial Incentives (Team profile)