This Free Life Campaign: Increasing Intention to Quit Among LGBTQ+ Young Adult Nondaily Smokers in Minneapolis

PURPOSE: LGBTQ+ young adults smoke at disproportionately higher rates than their non-LGBTQ+ counterparts, but prevention efforts are limited. Furthermore, prior to This Free Life (TFL), no known campaigns target LGBTQ+ nondaily smokers. In this study Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota evaluated a local partnership extension of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Center for Tobacco Products’ TFL campaign. METHODS: The intervention featured a variety of LGBTQ+-tailored events, social/digital media, and out-of-home media placed in locations with a high density of LGBTQ+ young adults. Cross-sectional surveys (n = 1215) were collected from LGBTQ+ young adult (18-26) nondaily smokers at 4 time points between 2016 and 2019. The national TFL campaign was tracked in a separate evaluation conducted by the FDA. RESULTS: 43.0% of nondaily LGBTQ+ smokers reported awareness of the campaign (n = 522), and 63.4% of those also engaged with TFL (n = 330). Engagement was highest for gay, lesbian and transgender participants, and for Asian and Black/African American participants. Each additional instance of campaign engagement increased participants’ odds of intending to quit smoking by 20% (AOR = 1.20; 95% CI = 1.05, 1.36). The relationship between campaign engagement and intention to quit was fully mediated by the campaign’s impact on attitudes against smoking and perceived normative trends, but not by perceived behavioral control. CONCLUSION: The local extension of TFL increased intentions to quit for LGBTQ+ nondaily smokers. Future research should further explore the relationship between perceived behavioral control and intentions to quit for nondaily smokers.