NCT06919263

Influencer E-Cigarette and Cannabis Marketing: a Survey-Based Experiment Among Adolescents

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 1,462 (actual)
• Sponsor: University of Southern California · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 16 Years – 17 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Adolescent non-users of e-cigarettes and cannabis (N = 1,462) participated in the in-class survey-based experiment. They were randomly shown 3 pairs of images featuring influencers promoting e-cigarettes alongside cannabis, (experimental group), or no-substance use or display (placebo treatment), or e-cigarette promotion alone (control). After viewing each pair of images, participants rated perceptions of influencer credibility (i.e., honesty, trustworthiness, knowledge) on the scale of 0 (e.g., dishonest) to 100 (honest). Susceptibility to use e-cigarettes was assessed after participants viewed all the images. These outcomes were then compared among participants who perceived influencers as credible and those who perceived influencers as non-credible.

Detailed description

Adolescents (13-17 years of age) living in California were recruited by Tobacco Center of Regulatory Science at the University of Southern California (USC TCORS) to participate in the ADVANCE survey cohort focused on tobacco-related attitudes and behaviors. Participants completed the experiment, which was part of the survey at cohort's Wave 7, on Chromebooks in classroom. All participants provided informed consent and parental assent prior to participating in the experiment. The study was approved by the University of Southern California Institutional Review Board (HS-19-00682-AM016). Respondents were randomly shown 3 pairs of images featuring influencers promoting e-cigarettes (image 1) paired with cannabis (image 2), (experimental group), or no-substance use or display (two images featuring neutral profiles of influencers), (placebo treatment), or e-cigarette promotion (image 1) paired with a neutral profile (with no e-cigarette) of the influencer featured in image 1 (control).

Conditions

• Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Influencer marketing	Participants viewed survey-imbedded promotional images featuring influencers

Timeline

• Start date: 2023-09-25
• Primary completion: 2023-11-30
• Completion: 2023-11-30
• First posted: 2025-04-09
• Last updated: 2025-04-09

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States