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Impact of Vaping Prevention Advertisements

UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center logo

UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center

Status

Completed

Conditions

Vaping

Treatments

Behavioral: Neutral vaping ads
Behavioral: The FDA's The Real Cost vaping prevention ads - Addiction theme
Behavioral: The FDA's The REal Cost vaping prevention ads - Health harms theme

Study type

Interventional

Funder types

Other
Other U.S. Federal agency
NIH

Identifiers

NCT04836455
19-3174
1R01CA246600-01 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this randomized controlled trial is to determine whether exposure to vaping prevention advertisements (ads) reduce susceptibility to vaping among adolescents. Previous studies have been informative, but they have tended to be one-time experimental studies that do not replicate the repeated exposures to ads that people have in the real world. This study addresses this issue by repeatedly exposing participants to vaping prevention ads over time. Participants will be adolescents aged 13-17 who currently vape or who are susceptible to vaping.

Participants will be randomly assigned to ad stimuli. They will be assigned to one of two The Real Cost trial arms-health harms or addiction-or to a control trial arm (probability of assignment is 1/3 for all trial arms). Participants in the study will take 4 online surveys over a 3-week period, once per week (At week 0, 1, 2, and 3). All participants will view randomized ad stimuli based on their trial arm and answer surveys items at each session.

Full description

Tobacco prevention mass media campaigns are a key tool for reducing tobacco use among adolescents. While vaping has increased greatly among adolescents, there has been a dearth of research on effective communication strategies to reduce vaping. This study will test the impact of advertisements from the Food and Drug Administration's The Real Cost campaign on reducing susceptibility to vaping in a randomized controlled trial, illuminating whether such ads are effective as well as what themes are most effective (i.e., health harms, addiction). The investigators focus on adolescents (ages 13-17) who currently vape or are at risk of vaping.

Setting: The trial will be a longitudinal online study with 4 surveys over a 3 week period - 1 survey per week.

Recruitment: Adolescent participants will be recruited through Qualtrics, an online survey panel platform. Interested prospective participants will complete a screening questionnaire to determine their eligibility. If eligible, Qualtrics will invite them to enroll in the trial.

Informed Consent: Qualtrics will obtain parental consent online for adolescents who are eligible and interested in participating. After parental consent, adolescents will provide online assent prior to taking the survey.

Randomization: After providing informed assent, Qualtrics survey software will randomly assign participants to one of the three trial arms. Participants will have an equal chance of being randomized to any of the 3 trial arms.

Assessment: Participants in the study will take 4 surveys over a 3-week period. This will allow for multiple exposures to campaign ads. At week 0, randomize participants will be randomized to 1 of 2 FDA The Real Cost vaping prevention ad trial arms (health harms or addiction) or to a control arm (investigator created neutral ads about vaping). In each condition, participants will view 3 ads at each session, in a random order, corresponding to the theme they were assigned. At the first session (week 0), each participant will complete measures of vaping and smoking behavior, and will then view the ads that correspond to their trial arm. They will complete measures assessing message reactions after viewing each ad, followed by measures of susceptibility to vaping, vaping and smoking beliefs, and finally questions assessing demographics. For week 1 and 2 assessments, participants will complete measures of susceptibility to vaping, vaping and smoking beliefs, and vaping and smoking behavior. They will then view the same 3 ads from their trial arm and complete the message reactions measures. For the week 3 assessment, participants will only complete measures of susceptibility to vaping, vaping and smoking beliefs, and vaping and smoking behavior. Each survey will take approximately 15 minutes.

Enrollment

1,565 patients

Sex

All

Ages

13 to 17 years old

Volunteers

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

  • Between ages 13-17 years old
  • Be able to read and speak English
  • Be able to take an online survey in English
  • Be susceptible to vaping

Exclusion criteria

  • None

Trial design

Primary purpose

Prevention

Allocation

Randomized

Interventional model

Parallel Assignment

Masking

None (Open label)

1,565 participants in 3 patient groups

The Real Cost vaping prevention ads - Health effects theme
Experimental group
Treatment:
Behavioral: The FDA's The REal Cost vaping prevention ads - Health harms theme
The Real Cost vaping prevention ads - Addiction theme
Experimental group
Treatment:
Behavioral: The FDA's The Real Cost vaping prevention ads - Addiction theme
Neutral vaping ads
Other group
Treatment:
Behavioral: Neutral vaping ads

Trial documents
2

Trial contacts and locations

1

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Data sourced from clinicaltrials.gov

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