Motion Picture Trailers Aired on T.V. Expose Teens to Smoking Although a 1971 advertising ban restricts tobacco companies from promoting their deadly products on television, teens are still being exposed to smoking on television via movie trailers. A recent American Legacy Foundation study, published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, reveals that during a 12-month period between 2001 and 2002, 95% of youth in the United States saw images of tobacco use in movie trailers while watching television. Research shows that the depiction of smoking in movies has an enormous effect on youth smoking initiation. The study's authors have issued a call to action within the public health community to: (1) insist that the motion picture industry eliminate such imagery from their trailers; and (2) ask the television networks not to air movie trailers containing smoking imagery.