Suggestions that smokers might be less attractive to the opposite sex are more likely to persuade them to give it up than warnings of death on cigarette packs.

This is the conclusion of a study at Universities in America and Switzerland which found that those especially influenced by the loss of attractiveness argument were teenagers who smoked to impress, or for peer group approval.

A few years back a TV ad showed two boys discussing a girl who smoked, who they said was “like kissing an old ashtray”