Smoking and The Simpsons.

Objective: To determine the frequency of smoking on The Simpsons television show, and the relationship with the sex and age groups of characters shown smoking, and with positive, negative and neutral connotations associated with instances of smoking.

Design And Setting: Content analysis (performed from January to October 2008) of instances of smoking that appeared in the first 18 seasons of The Simpsons television show, which aired from 1989 to 2007.

Main Outcome Measures: Frequency, impact (positive, negative, neutral) of instances of smoking; and frequency associated with age (child or adolescent versus adult characters), sex and types of characters on the show.