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E-cigarette commercials increase urge to smoke cigarettes

The use of visual depictions of vaping in e-cigarette commercials may serve as cigarette smoking cues to smokers and former smokers, increasing the urge to smoke and smoking behavior, according to recent study results.

Erin K. Maloney, PhD, of the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication, and Joseph N. Cappella, PhD, studied 884 adult daily smokers (n = 301), intermittent smokers (n = 272), and former smokers (n = 311) to analyze the effect e-cigarette advertising had on participants.

Erin K. Maloney

Maloney and Cappella searched Google, YouTube and various e-cigarette brand Web sites between January and September 2013 and identified 16 advertisements representing 12 brands to show participants.

Participants were randomly assigned to one of three experimental conditions. The cue condition consisted of viewing three commercials selected with visual smoking cues; participants in the no cue condition viewed three edited commercials selected without any visual smoking cues. Participants in the no ad condition viewed no ads, but answered 14 questions about media use.

The researchers said daily smokers in the cue condition reported higher post-test urge to smoke a tobacco cigarette than daily smokers in the no cue condition (P < .001) and daily smokers in the no ad condition (P = .001).

Former smokers’ intentions to continue refraining from smoking were lower in the cue condition than the no cue condition (P = .044) and the no ad condition (P = .025).

The researchers wrote that with e-cigarette advertising growing to a $1 billion market and growth expected to increase by 50% during the next 4 years, e-cigarette promotion will become more assertive.

“Given the sophistication of cigarette marketing in the past and the exponential increase in advertising dollars allotted to e-cigarette promotion in the past year, it should be expected that advertisements for these products created by big tobacco companies will maximize smoking cues in their advertisements, and if not regulated, individuals will be exposed to much more e-cigarette advertising on a daily basis,” the researchers wrote. – by Ryan McDonald

Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.