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Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults

BACKGROUND: Tobacco companies argue that the decision to smoke is made by well-informed rational adults who have considered all the risks and benefits of smoking. Yet in promoting their products, the tobacco industry frequently relies on affect, portraying their products as part of a desirable lifes...

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Autores principales: Popova, Lucy, Owusu, Daniel, Weaver, Scott R., Kemp, Catherine B., Mertz, C. K., Pechacek, Terry F., Slovic, Paul
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5863900/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29566752
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5306-z
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author Popova, Lucy
Owusu, Daniel
Weaver, Scott R.
Kemp, Catherine B.
Mertz, C. K.
Pechacek, Terry F.
Slovic, Paul
author_facet Popova, Lucy
Owusu, Daniel
Weaver, Scott R.
Kemp, Catherine B.
Mertz, C. K.
Pechacek, Terry F.
Slovic, Paul
author_sort Popova, Lucy
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Tobacco companies argue that the decision to smoke is made by well-informed rational adults who have considered all the risks and benefits of smoking. Yet in promoting their products, the tobacco industry frequently relies on affect, portraying their products as part of a desirable lifestyle. Research examining the roles of affect and perceived risks in smoking has been scant and non-existent for novel tobacco products, such as electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes). METHODS: We examined the relationship between affect, perceived risk, and current use for cigarettes and e-cigarettes in 2015 in a nationally representative sample of 5398 U.S. adults who were aware of e-cigarettes. RESULTS: Participants held various affective associations with tobacco products, and affect towards cigarettes was more negative than affect towards e-cigarettes. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), affect towards cigarettes and e-cigarettes was associated with cigarette smoking and e-cigarette use respectively, and these associations were both direct and partially mediated by risk perceptions towards smoking and e-cigarette use. More positive affect towards cigarettes or e-cigarettes was associated with lower perceived risks, which in turn was associated with higher odds of being a current cigarette or e-cigarette user. CONCLUSIONS: In developing models explaining tobacco use behavior, or in creating public communication campaigns aimed at curbing tobacco use, it is useful to focus not only on the reason based predictors, such as perceptions of risks and benefits, but also on affective predictors. Educational efforts aimed at further smoking reductions should highlight and reinforce negative images and associations with cigarettes. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-018-5306-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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spelling pubmed-58639002018-03-27 Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults Popova, Lucy Owusu, Daniel Weaver, Scott R. Kemp, Catherine B. Mertz, C. K. Pechacek, Terry F. Slovic, Paul BMC Public Health Research Article BACKGROUND: Tobacco companies argue that the decision to smoke is made by well-informed rational adults who have considered all the risks and benefits of smoking. Yet in promoting their products, the tobacco industry frequently relies on affect, portraying their products as part of a desirable lifestyle. Research examining the roles of affect and perceived risks in smoking has been scant and non-existent for novel tobacco products, such as electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes). METHODS: We examined the relationship between affect, perceived risk, and current use for cigarettes and e-cigarettes in 2015 in a nationally representative sample of 5398 U.S. adults who were aware of e-cigarettes. RESULTS: Participants held various affective associations with tobacco products, and affect towards cigarettes was more negative than affect towards e-cigarettes. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), affect towards cigarettes and e-cigarettes was associated with cigarette smoking and e-cigarette use respectively, and these associations were both direct and partially mediated by risk perceptions towards smoking and e-cigarette use. More positive affect towards cigarettes or e-cigarettes was associated with lower perceived risks, which in turn was associated with higher odds of being a current cigarette or e-cigarette user. CONCLUSIONS: In developing models explaining tobacco use behavior, or in creating public communication campaigns aimed at curbing tobacco use, it is useful to focus not only on the reason based predictors, such as perceptions of risks and benefits, but also on affective predictors. Educational efforts aimed at further smoking reductions should highlight and reinforce negative images and associations with cigarettes. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-018-5306-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. BioMed Central 2018-03-22 /pmc/articles/PMC5863900/ /pubmed/29566752 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5306-z Text en © The Author(s). 2018 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Research Article
Popova, Lucy
Owusu, Daniel
Weaver, Scott R.
Kemp, Catherine B.
Mertz, C. K.
Pechacek, Terry F.
Slovic, Paul
Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults
title Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults
title_full Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults
title_fullStr Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults
title_full_unstemmed Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults
title_short Affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of U.S. adults
title_sort affect, risk perception, and the use of cigarettes and e-cigarettes: a population study of u.s. adults
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5863900/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29566752
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5306-z
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