According to a 1975 survey conducted by the National Clearinghouse for Smoking and Health, attitudes toward smoking are becoming increasingly negative. While studies assessing the impact of counselor smoking on clients suggest that no overwhelmingly harmful impact on clients' perceptions of therapists occurs, the issue of the impact of counselor's smoking on prospective clients remains unresolved. A study was conducted to examine the effect of smoking counselors on the initial impressions of potential clients, both nonsmoking and smoking, and to determine these subjects' expectations of therapeutic gain. Subjects were 27 smoking and 27 nonsmoking female undergraduates who were randomly assigned to conditions and counselors. Subjects viewed a videotape of a male counselor in either a smoking or nonsmoking condition in a counseling session with an off-camera female client. Subjects completed the Counselor Rating Form, a modified Counselor Confidence Ratings form, the Relationship Inventory, and a post-experimental questionnaire. The results revealed that neither the counselor's nor the subject's smoking had any bearing on the subject's judgments concerning the counselor's personal characteristics, subject's expectancies for obtaining help with specific problems, perceived quality of the client-therapist relationship, or subject's judgments of the therapist as an emerging counselor. A review of the literature and the present findings both suggest that therapist smoking has neither a strong nor a negative initial impact on prospective clients. (NB)