Mahdi Abbasi - Department of Psychology, Bandargaz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Bandargaz, Iran

Background and Aim : Many people are killed by smoking each year. Smokers consider cigarette smoking as a way of running away from their problems and forgetting them. They hold the strong belief that smoking helps them to relieve or reduce their stress. People’s personality is composed of a number of broad traits and characteristics, and personality traits focus on identifying and measuring these individual personality traits. So, The purpose of the current study was to examine the relationship between personality traits and cigarette craving.Methods : The correlational research design was used in this study which was conducted using convenience sampling of 150 people in the city of Gorgan with the 12-item Tobacco Craving Questionnaire (Berlin et al.,2005) and the Neo Five-Factor Personality Inventory (McCrae & Costa, 1985). Data were analyzed by Pearson correlation and stepwise regression.Results : The results showed that neuroticism (N) and agreeableness (A) are directly and positively related to cigarette craving but other personality traits including conscientiousness (C), openness to experience (O) and extroversion (E) have no significant positive relationships with cigarette craving. Conclusion : Based on these findings, it can be concluded that individuals with high scores on neuroticism and agreeableness may have stronger craving for cigarettes, and thus by examining these two personality factors we can control and manage the cigarette cravings of these individuals

Cigarette craving, Personality traits, Neuroticism, Agreeableness