Smoking, Vaping Behavior, and the Experience of Depressive Symptoms Among High School Students in Jakarta, Indonesia

Background: Smoking is a form of risky behavior that often starts in adolescence and is continued into adulthood. There has also been an increase in the use of vaping among adolescents. Adolescents who smoke have a double the risk of having depression symptoms compared to those who don’t smoke. Objectives: This study aimed to investigate smoking and vaping behaviors and the experience of depressive symptoms among high school students in Jakarta, Indonesia. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study used the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance (YRBS) 2017 questionnaire. Participants included 258 students aged between 10 and 19, randomly chosen from three types of senior high schools in Jakarta. Results: We found that 21.5% of students frequently smoked in the last 30 days, and 8.1% vaped repeatedly. However, 70.5% of them tried vaping. Moreover, within the last 12 months, approximately 8.5% of the students attempted suicide at least once. Also, 32.9% of them felt sad and hopeless for two weeks. Interestingly, we found that 54.1% of the students who felt sad were frequent smokers, and 43.5% were regular vapers. Conclusions: This study showed that risky behaviors like smoking and vaping were prevalent among senior high school students in Jakarta. Students who smoked or vaped exhibited depressive symptoms. Therefore, smoking and vaping could affect mental health in adolescence.