The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report is based on national surveys collected in 1999, involving more than 15,349 high-school students.

Dr. Richard Lowry and his colleagues found that girls who said they were trying to lose weight were 40 percent more likely to smoke cigarettes than their less weight-conscious female peers.

The study also found that male teens who exercised to control their weight were more likely to adopt other healthy behaviors, such as eating right and not smoking cigarettes.

"Efforts to promote healthy weight management among adolescents are needed and should place greater emphasis on combining physical activity with a reduced fat and calorie diet, increasing fruit and vegetable consumption, and discouraging smoking and other unhealthy weight-control practices," Lowry and his team wrote.

The study is published in the August 2002 issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health.

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