Smoking is one of the most important leading causes of lung cancer. Smoking habit is recognized as nicotine dependence, which consists of physical and psychosocial dependence. To evaluate social nicotine dependence, the Kano Test for Social Nicotine Dependence (KTSND) working group developed a new questionnaire. We examined the social nicotine dependence among high school students, university students and patients with lung cancer.

We applied Korean version of KTSND(KTSND-K) questionnaire to high school students, university students and patients with lung cancer. Complete data obtained from the 1333 responders were analyzed.

Among the responders, current smokers, past-smokers, and never-smokers were 17.3%, 16.4%, and 66.3% respectively. According to smoking status, the total KTSND-K scores of current smokers were significantly higher than those of past-smokers, and of never-smokers (17.7±6.6 versus 13.7±5.7, and 10.9±5.15, P<0.001). The total KTSND-K scores of males were higher than those of females, suggesting that males have a propensity for depending nicotine socially much more than females (13.2±6.2 and 11.7±5.7 respectively, P<0.05). And the total KTSND scores of the patients with lung cancer, medical students, nursing students, and high school students were 11.2±3.8, 14.9±4.8, 14.6±5.8 and 15.6±5.9 respectively. The scores of patients with lung cancer were significantly lower than non-cancer people(P<0.01). Our study suggested that the KTSND-K questionnaire could be a useful method to evaluate psychosocial aspects of smoking in patients with lung cancer and non-cancer people.