Behavioural science and risk factors

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Smoking is the leading cause of cancer and preventable death in the UK. Smoking prevalence has been declining across the UK for some decades yet there are still around 4.9 million people who smoke in England, more than 325,000 who smoke in Wales, ...

Download the full Smoking prevalence projections for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland report(PDF, 1.44 MB) January 2025

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Smoking is the biggest cause of cancer and death in the UK. Estimates of the population-level burden of smoking-attributable cancer are useful to galvanise policymakers to try to reduce smoking rates...

View the full Projected UK cancer cases caused by tobacco in the current parliamentary term report(PDF, 492 KB) November 2024

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Smoking is the biggest cause of cancer and death in the UK. It causes at least 16 types of cancer. Smoking prevalence in the UK has been falling for decades; however, the pace of change has varied by sex and age (among other characteristics), ...

View the Smoking - attributable cancer cases in the UK full report(PDF, 499 KB) October 2024

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Smoking is the leading cause of preventable cancer and death in the UK. Deprived populations typically experience higher rates of smoking and cancer incidence. We calculated the proportion and number of smoking-related cancer cases by ...

Read the Socio-economic deprivation and cancer incidence in England: Quantifying the role of smoking report in full September 2022

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The proportion of current smokers in the population (smoking prevalence) has been falling for decades in the UK, However a clear deprivation gradient remains: smoking prevalence is around twice as high in routine and manual (R&M) workers ...

Read the Smoking trends by occupation group report(PDF, 456 KB) October 2019

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Overweight and obesity’ is the second biggest preventable cause of cancer after smoking. In 2018, Cancer Research UK launched an awareness raising campaign about the link between overweight and obesity and...

Read the full Obesity Campaign Evaluation

Download the Obesity Campaign Evaluation(PDF, 651 KB) May 2023

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Mass media campaigns can reach a large number of people with health messages, but it is unclear how effective these are at changing health behaviours. We conducted a narrative review of systematic reviews to ...

View The effect and cost-effectiveness of mass media campaigns on health behaviour change: A systematic review report(PDF, 577 KB) July 2022

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An advertising campaign piloted by Cancer Research UK in 2018 aimed to promote quit attempts by increasing awareness of the relative harms of e-cigarettes compared with smoking. A cross-sectional survey evaluation...

Read the full evaluation of the E-cigarette relative harms pilot campaign December 2019

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CRUK's training (“Talk Cancer”) aims to increase awareness of screening programmes and risk factors, promote more positive beliefs about cancer and increase confidence to discuss cancer with members of the public,...

Read the full Cancer Awareness Training evaluation December 2018

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Improving public awareness of cancer and encouraging health behaviour change are important aspects of cancer control. We investigated whether a community-based roadshow was an effective way of communicating...

Evaluating the impact of a community-based cancer awareness roadshow on awareness, attitudes and behaviours February 2024

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Research shows that leading a healthy lifestyle can help prevent cancer. Further, diagnosing cancer at an early stage can increase survival rates. Cancer Research UK (CRUK)'s nurse-led outreach activity supports cancer...

View the evidence-based redevelopment of a tool to support behaviour change full report(PDF, 6.2 MB) May 2019

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This report presents the data from the 2022 Lung Cancer Screening survey, led by Cancer Research UK (CRUK), conducted by YouGov and with the costs of the project covered by Scottish Power....

View the Cancer Research UK lung screening report(PDF, 2.13 MB) May 2022

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An exploration into public attitudes towards the new Faster Diagnosis Standard for cancer, due to be introduced in England in 2020, within the context of a patients’ recent referral experiences...

Exploring public attitudes towards the new Faster Diagnosis Standard for cancer full report May 2019

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Mass media campaigns can reach a large number of people with health messages, but it is unclear how effective these are at changing health behaviours. We conducted a narrative review of systematic reviews to...

Read the CRUK patient survey(PDF, 9.43 MB) July 2021

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Despite growing evidence that e-cigarettes are less harmful than cigarettes, perceptions of equal or more harm have increased worldwide. This study aimed to identify the most common reasons behind people’s...

View the full report What drives public perceptions of e-cigarettes? February 2023

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In the United Kingdom, standardised packaging for cigarettes was phased in between May 2016 and May 2017. A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with current smokers aged 16+ in two regions of England when ...

View the full report March 2019