Researchers are raising the alarm about the increase of vaping among teenagers and how e-cigarette marketing strategies target youth.
Assistant Professor Laura Struik, who teaches in UBC Okanagan’s School of Nursing, recently published a paper examining why teens take up vaping and whether advertising capitalises on those reasons. The research was published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.
“This is the first study of its kind that makes direct links between reasons for youth uptake and the marketing strategies of e-cigarette companies,” says Struik. “The public needs to know how the next generation is being targeted to take up and ultimately become addicted to these nicotine products.”
Struik conducted the study with Assistant Professor Sarah Dow-Fleisner, who conducts research in the UBCO School of Social Work on development trajectories and resilient functioning of children and families in high-risk contexts.
The researchers say there are a variety of reasons teens take up vaping–ranging anywhere from managing stress or anxiety, curiosity, taste, peer pressure, easy access and even factors like it’s easy to hide from parents and is perceived to be less harmful than cigarettes.
When e-cigarettes first entered the North American market in 2008, they were hailed as a smoking cessation tool. However, Dow-Fleisner says when they take a closer look at who uses them, it’s clear teens do not use the products to quit smoking.
“According to recent statistics, only three per cent of Canadian youth in grades 7 to 12 are current smokers–while 20 per cent use e-cigarettes,” she says. “This suggests that upwards of 17 per cent of e-cigarette users were originally nonsmokers. In addition, among youth who do smoke combustible cigarettes, fewer than eight per cent of those report using e-cigarettes to quit smoking.”
Recent polls found that 95 per cent of teens said they were curious about vaping so they wanted to try it, while 81 per cent tried an e-cigarette because a friend vaped and 80 per cent reported continued e-cigarette use because they enjoyed the good flavours. More than 70 per cent of the teens agreed e-cigarettes were “cool and fun.”
Despite emerging evidence of both short and long-term health risks associated with vaping, Struik says the evidence is clear the other reasons teens take up vaping override the health risks.
“Youth don’t make the decision to vape because they don’t understand the risks or don’t care about the risks,” she says. “Young people are taking up vaping for a variety of reasons and e-cigarette companies are leveraging those diverse reasons to recruit teens into using their products. And it’s working.”
Struik and Dow-Fleisner, with their research assistants and UBCO’s Associate Chief Librarian Robert Janke, reviewed more than 800 studies and viewed numerous ecigarettes TV commercials.
“The TV advertisements we reviewed were found to tap into almost all of the reasons youth cite for taking up e-cigarettes,” says Dow-Fleisner. “The most highly-cited reasons were most prominently presented in the ads, including a focus on relational aspects of vaping and product-related benefits, such as a positive sensory experience.” (ANI)