Don't give up on me baby : spousal correlation in smoking behaviour.

Summary The authors use nine waves of the British Household Panel Survey to examine spousal interactions related to smoking. Spouses' smoking behaviors may be correlated for (at least) three reasons: matching in the marriage market of partners with identical health behaviors, strategic interactions in marriage about health investments that determine healthy time spent together (a public good), and transmission of information via observation of partner's smoking morbidity. Simple bivariate probits show that there is a positive correlation (all else being equal) between spouses' smoking status, consistent with explanations in terms of matching or strategic interactions. When fixed effects are controlled for, this correlation becomes insignificant: the authors interpret this result as evidence that smoking is not subject to strategic negotiation within couples. There would be more general matching of poor health risks in the marriage market.