sulin leading to a rise in blood sugar and you get a pretty powerful stimulant that gives an instant high.

So how do you get addicted?

Scientists have determined that addiction is generally a four-part process.

The first part is seduction - that's the advertising and peer pressure mentioned above. There's also urge to

You first lit up in your teens. You were invincible and knew you could quit any time. That first puff tasted vile but there was a kick to it. Your pulse raced and it catapulted you into that elite group who dared to live on the edge. Soon smoking became to feel as natural as breathing.

Now decades later you're much older and wiser and desperate to quit. And you worry about your own children. What happened during those first thrilling encounters with tobacco?

Simply put, a combination of peer pressure and seductive advertising lured you to take your first drag. Then, nicotine took over.

Nicotine is a psychoactive drug. In other words it affects brain chemistry. In fact, when it surges into the brain less than ten seconds after you draw tobacco smoke into your lungs, it sets the neurotransmitters in your brain dancing. A release of over 200 chemicals including dopamine, serotonin and beta-endorphins contributes to the boost in mood you feel when you get your fix. But that's not all.

Nicotine also increases the uptake of glucose by the brain. The result? That feeling of clarity and increased concentration that makes smoking so appealing and creates that ah! factor that animates the features of tobacco addicts.

Combine these with a release of adrenaline - the flight or fight hormone, and a suppression of insulin leading to a rise in blood sugar and you get a pretty powerful stimulant that gives an instant high.

So how do you get addicted?

Scientists have determined that addiction is generally a four-part process.

The first part is seduction - that's the advertising and peer pressure mentioned above. There's also urge to e

and desperate to quit. And you worry about your own children. What happened during those first thrilling encounters with tobacco?

Simply put, a combination of peer pressure and seductive advertising lured you to take your first drag. Then, nicotine took over.

Nicotine is a psychoactive drug. In other words it affects brain chemistry. In fact, when it surges into the brain less than ten seconds after you draw tobacco smoke into your lungs, it sets the neurotransmitters in your brain dancing. A release of over 200 chemicals including dopamine, serotonin and beta-endorphins contributes to the boost in mood you feel when you get your fix. But that's not all.

Nicotine also increases the uptake of glucose by the brain. The result? That feeling of clarity and increased concentration that makes smoking so appealing and creates that ah! factor that animates the features of tobacco addicts.

Combine these with a release of adrenaline - the flight or fight hormone, and a suppression of insulin leading to a rise in blood sugar and you get a pretty powerful stimulant that gives an instant high.

So how do you get addicted?

Scientists have determined that addiction is generally a four-part process.

The first part is seduction - that's the advertising and peer pressure mentioned above. There's also urge to

hemistry. In fact, when it surges into the brain less than ten seconds after you draw tobacco smoke into your lungs, it sets the neurotransmitters in your brain dancing. A release of over 200 chemicals including dopamine, serotonin and beta-endorphins contributes to the boost in mood you feel when you get your fix. But that's not all.

Nicotine also increases the uptake of glucose by the brain. The result? That feeling of clarity and increased concentration that makes smoking so appealing and creates that ah! factor that animates the features of tobacco addicts.

Combine these with a release of adrenaline - the flight or fight hormone, and a suppression of insulin leading to a rise in blood sugar and you get a pretty powerful stimulant that gives an instant high.

So how do you get addicted?

Scientists have determined that addiction is generally a four-part process.

The first part is seduction - that's the advertising and peer pressure mentioned above. There's also urge to

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Nicotine also increases the uptake of glucose by the brain. The result? That feeling of clarity and increased concentration that makes smoking so appealing and creates that ah! factor that animates the features of tobacco addicts.

Combine these with a release of adrenaline - the flight or fight hormone, and a suppression of insulin leading to a rise in blood sugar and you get a pretty powerful stimulant that gives an instant high.

So how do you get addicted?

Scientists have determined that addiction is generally a four-part process.

The first part is seduction - that's the advertising and peer pressure mentioned above. There's also urge to

sulin leading to a rise in blood sugar and you get a pretty powerful stimulant that gives an instant high.

So how do you get addicted?

Scientists have determined that addiction is generally a four-part process.

The first part is seduction - that's the advertising and peer pressure mentioned above. There's also urge to emulate the tough handsome guys or seductive vamps in the old movies who always seem to have a cigarette in hand.

Seduction is followed by experimentation when you take your first tentative puffs and join the group that dares to flout its independence.

Soon for many, smoking becomes a regular activity though still limited. After school smoking rituals forge bonds between budding addicts who mock their timid peers afraid to join the club.

The problem is that you need increasing amounts of nicotine to get their high. So the few puffs a day behind the school turn into a pack or two a day. Every day.

So finally you're addicted. You smoke openly. It's a part of your life.

Scientists used to think that getting hooked on nicotine was a long process taking up to a year or more. But recent findings from the Mayo Clinic suggest that kids who'd smoked just a few cigarettes were as addicted as hardened adult smokers. Nicotine is that powerful.

It's estimated that those teen smokers who do manage to quit later in life smoke for 20 years on average before kicking the habit. Some never do. Half of all teenagers currently smoking will die of tobacco-related diseases unless they manage to quit in time.

Clearly it's better never to start and understanding the addiction process can alert you to the dangerous st