Join us for an OUHSC Qualitative Methods Community of Practice (QMCOP) & UCSF Qualitative Working Group (QWG) Joint Seminar

EVENT DATE: January 21, 2025

EVENT TIME: 10-11AM Pacific / 12-1PM Central

Join via Zoom. Click Here to Register! https://qualtrics.ou.edu/jfe/form/SV_8rcafU839WgvHyC  

Seminar Title: “Babe, you said you were only going to smoke this many”: Partners’ attempts to influence each other’s cigarette smoking and quit attempts within sexual and/or gender minoritized dual-smoking couples

Speaker: Lillian Hermes & Chris Sipols

Seminar Summary: 

Couples in which both members smoke cigarettes (i.e. dual-smoking couples; DSCs) are highly prevalent among people who smoke and particularly unlikely to achieve abstinence. Tobacco use disparities persist among sexual and/or gender minoritized (SGM) people, yet little is known about the unique cessation needs of SGM couples (i.e., couples with at least one SGM individual). SGM individuals in a DSC were recruited nationally. Participants (N=22) completed a baseline survey and 60-minute, one-on-one, semi-structured interview. Interviews prompted rich discussion regarding participants’ relationships and dynamics around smoking and cessation therein. The current sub-analysis followed a team-based, inductive-deductive thematic approach to characterize goals, motives, and methods of attempts to influence smoking and cessation behavior within SGM DSCs. Findings will inform SGM-tailored cessation counseling strategies and materials to support cessation-promoting dynamics within SGM DSCs, thereby improving health outcomes for individuals at the intersection of these groups with low cessation rates. Future research should determine the extent to which these findings are unique to SGM DSCs versus their cisgender, heterosexual counterparts

Speaker bio:

Lillian Hermes: Lillian Hermes is originally from the suburbs of Chicago and received her B.A in Biological Sciences from the University of Chicago in 2021. She is currently a second-year medical student at the University of Oklahoma. Lillian joined Dr. Julia McQuoid's lab as a part of OUCOM's Family Medicine Summer Research Experience in June 2025 and has enjoyed being part of her team since.

Chris Sipols: Chris Sipols is from Edmond, Oklahoma. He received his B.S. in microbiology at the University of Oklahoma. He is in his second year of medical school at the University of Oklahoma College of Medicine. He joined Dr. Julia McQuoid's team in June 2025, becoming involved in health promotion research focused on smoking in sexual and gender minoritized populations. 

The seminar will be recorded and made available via the QMCOP and QWG listservs.

Questions? Email Dr. Julia McQuoid at Julia-McQuoid@ouhsc.edu; Dr. Kim Koester at Kimberly.Koester@ucsf.edu; Dr. Neil Jordan at Neil-Jordan@ouhsc.edu; or Dr. Kerstin Reinschmidt at Kerstin-Reinschmidt@ouhsc.edu