Workplace ban helps employees reduce cigarette use. (adapted from the American Journal of Public Health, 1994)

Workplace smoking bans are on the rise because of concerns about second-hand smoke exposure. The benefits for nonsmokers are clear, but what about smokers?

Researchers and policy makers have questioned whether smoking bans motivate smokers to cut back on their smoking, or do they compensate by smoking more heavily outside the workplace. A study in the American Journal of Public Health adds authority to a growing body of evidence that workplace bans help smokers cut back.

Janet Brigham, Ph.D., and co-investigators at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine recruited 34 smokers employed at a hospital where a smoking ban was about to be implemented and a …