Table 1.

Characteristics of the Spouse Pairs and the Concordance of Smoking Status in the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study, 1986–1998

Characteristic	Individual Data					Paired Data, %
	Husbands		Wives		P Value	H+/W+	H+/W−	H−/W+	H−/W−	P Valuea
	%	Mean (SD)	%	Mean (SD)
Overall baseline
White race	85		84		0.95	84	<1	<1	15	0.82
Education <12th grade	23		17		<0.001	10	12	6	71	<0.001
Household income <$50,000b	67		68		0.87	67	1	2	30	<0.001
Hypertension	33		29		<0.001	12	21	17	50	<0.001
History of CHD	9		2		<0.001	<1	8	2	90	<0.001
Never smoked	31		57		<0.001	21	8	34	37	<0.001
Age, years		55 (5.4)		53 (5.2)	<0.001
Body mass indexc		27.5 (4.1)		27.1 (5.7)	<0.001
Alcohol intake, servings/week		4.7 (8.5)		1.5 (3.5)	<0.001
Among pairs in which  both partners are  ever smokers
Former smokersd,e
Visit 1f	62		52		<0.001	40	22	12	26	<0.001
Visit 2f	67		62		<0.001	48	20	14	19	<0.001
Visit 3f	76		68		<0.001	57	19	11	13	<0.001
Visit 4f	80		75		<0.001	64	16	11	9	<0.001

Abbreviations: CHD, coronary heart disease; H+, husband has the characteristic; H−, husband does not have the characteristic; W+, wife has the characteristic; W−, wife does not have the characteristic.

^a McNemar's exact P value.

^b Men and women reported information separately.

^c Weight (kg)/height (m)².

^d Former smokers are the inverse of current smokers.

^e Visit 1 represents baseline; follow-up visits occurred 3 years apart.

^f At visit 1, n = 1,652; at visit 2, n = 1,551; at visit 3, n = 1,308; and at visit 4, n = 1,140.