Topic: Smoke
Audience: Smokers Who Want to Quit
One day, a young man went to the hospital to visit his seriously ill colleague. This colleague said that he had lung cancer. The doctor judged that he had only one year of life, and he regretted it now. He said that the doctor gave him a simple clock and told him that due to long time smoking, on this clock, his life had reached the end of 11 o’clock. At this time, he took out the magic clock with difficulty and asked the young man that you also smoke, what time do you think you are now? After the young man saw the clock, he trembled and stammered: “You scared me. My life has just begun, and it’s still at 1 o’clock.”…The warning of the clock and the terminal illness of his colleagues made the young man ended visit early. After leaving the ward, he threw a box of cigarettes into the trash can and whispered: “This is lucky, I’m only at 1 o’clock. Wish me healthy!!!”
Prototype:
This prototype I call it “life clock”. It is the form of my topic. Its main body is made by carton paper. And in the middle, one cigarette represents the hand of the clock. 12 pictures show 12 different status of a smoker in his life and represent 12 hours. It’s easy to play, you just show this clock to any of smokers and ask them move the hand of clock to tell himself what time he/she is at. I think this is a big shock to smokers.
I shared this prototype to my cohort group which include “Dorian, Haoqi and Parisa”. And here is some comments from them.
Dorian — Could u be connected this clock to cigarette box, like design an QR code on box and when scanning it user will get a virtual clock and if user enter his age of smoke and quantity of daily smoke, this virtual clock will show you what time you are at now. This probably will be the next step to design.
Parisa — have some terrible pictures to scare smokers like bad tooth or lung with cancer. This is give a big shock to warning smokers.
Haoqi — Previously, I wrote many words to explain the status of each hour, but Haoqi suggest that big cords in center is enough, because words will limit people’s imagination. So I removed words from final version.
When you see my prototype, I think you have know my direction which is help people who want to quit smoking.
Why people will smoke by generation and generation? It is because chemical substance Nicotine which makes smoker addictive and a psychological addiction.
Smoking addiction is actually a chronic neurological disease that is addicted to nicotine, and addiction to cigarettes is essentially addiction and dependence on nicotine. Nicotine enters the brain through the blood, and the central nervous system of the brain secretes “dopamine” when stimulated by nicotine. Dopamine is like a stimulant, which can make the human brain excited and happy. However, nicotine is easily excreted from the body. When the nicotine content of the human body decreases, the secretion of dopamine decreases. At this time, the smoker is eager to smoke another cigarette… The problem does not stop there. The dopamine level in the brain of the smoker will be about 20% lower than normal. Now it is assumed that the dopamine level in the brain of non-smokers is 100, then the dopamine level in the brain of smokers is 80, and smokers can only increase the level of dopamine secretion by smoking (it can only increase to 100). But after smoking, as the nicotine decreased, dopamine dropped to 80 or even lower, and then couldn’t help but pick up the next cigarette.
Psychological addiction refers to the result of the combined effect of memories, habits, hobbies, conditioning, etc. about smoking in the subconscious. The long-term repetition of these behaviors has formed memories. If you don’t smoke, you will feel empty. The longer you smoke, the heavier your psychological addiction and the harder it will be to quit. This process of quitting smoking will be very helpless, but it can only be wiped out and forgotten by time.
Key point is how we can make smokers quit ?
If you follow below suggestions your life will be changed.
— You must have a very strong belief and you need to set a quit target date.
— Prepare substitutes, which can be vegetables and fruits, or even a chewing gum that you often chew after smoking.
— Stay away from places that will tempt you to smoke.
— Make yourself busy in the beginning 2 weeks.
— Mark number on cigarette from 1~30, it means only 1 cigarette a day.
— Tobacco company can make same length of cigarette but with longer filter.
— Pass the money that you use to buy cigarette to your family members who can return to you every month. Then you will be happy to get extra salary monthly.
— E-cigarette and Quit smoking stickers could be a temporarily solution.
Final Presentation Link
Reflection:
Regarding my research smoking, I learned that it is the physical and psychological addiction that makes people unable to leave cigarettes. Although everyone knows that physical addiction comes from nicotine, I have only understood the principle of nicotine addiction through this research. What is more mysterious is that psychological addiction is the greatest resistance to quitting smoking, because it has become a habit, not the will that can be overcome, but the need to remind yourself all the time.
My project works surround the prototype “life clock”. This is my sudden inspiration. Initially, I made this prototype with cardboard and cigarettes based on inspiration. And designed a scene story with clear meaning (visiting patients). Take this as the beginning of my speech. Then, through a lot of reading materials, I used data and graphics to show you the reasons why it is difficult for people to quit smoking. Finally, I also provided many simple and effective ways to quit smoking. I hope that smokers can be warned after reading my research and give up smoking. After I showed you the results of my research, the most attractive one was probably the prototype. The most common feedback is that this clock of life is a simple and clear warning sign, which can be placed in more conspicuous public places to replace ordinary no-smoking signs to give people a more eye-catching warning. The students also look forward to seeing the finished product of this prototype, an electronic version of the APP, which is more practical and interesting. The electronic version of the APP will be designed to more accurately predict the impact of smoking on your life, and use some more explicit photos as a warning. At the same time, the teacher also asked, can this clock go back? The answer is yes. If you are determined to quit smoking, and have obvious results, such as smoking less every day, or even successfully quitting after a period of time, then you can move the pointer back to tell yourself that my life has gone back. The user of this study currently defines smokers who want to quit. Of course, I still hope that it can be extended to all smokers who will be deeply moved after reading my research. Therefore, I hope that this research can reveal in more depth that smoking not only causes great harm to the smoker, but also seriously affects the people around him. Even if you don’t care about yourself, think about your relatives around you, they may become victims of cigarettes unknowingly. Maybe I want to find a more effective warning method, such as another obvious metaphor other than the clock of life, rather than just some explicit photos. Secondly, I will also consider how to make it easier for people to see my research. For example, hang the prototype clock in a public place, push a virtual APP to everyone who buys cigarettes, and go to school for promotion, so that the new generation of people will put an end to the temptation of cigarettes before they fall into the abyss of cigarettes.
In short, I will continue to improve this project, hoping to bring pure air to this earth.