City Research Online

Smoking versus vaping: How (not) to communicate their relative harms

Ayton, P. ORCID: 0000-0003-2285-4608 & Weiss-Cohen, L. (2020). Smoking versus vaping: How (not) to communicate their relative harms. Journal of Risk Research, 24(2), pp. 198-214. doi: 10.1080/13669877.2020.1749117

Abstract

Here we consider how the relative harms of two nicotine products were communicated in a public health campaign. Following a peer-reviewed evaluation that rated the relative harm of a range of nicotine products relative to the harm of smoking, and which rated the relative harm of vaping as about 5% that of smoking (D. J. Nutt et al., 2014 European Addiction Research, 20(5), 218–225), the UK government launched a campaign which transposed these relative harms into relative safety, promoting the message that “vaping is 95% safer than smoking”. We discuss the communication issues arising from transposing a measure of relative harms into relative safety and report the results of an experiment which shows that significantly more people correctly appreciated the ratio of the relative harms from smoking and vaping after reading the statement “vaping is 5% as harmful as smoking” than after reading the statement “vaping is 95% safer than smoking”. We discuss the policy implications of our findings.

Publication Type: Article
Additional Information: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Risk Research, on 28th April 2020: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/13669877.asp
Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology
H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine > RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine
Departments: School of Health & Psychological Sciences > Psychology
SWORD Depositor:
[thumbnail of Smoking versus vaping- How (not) to communicate their relative harms ACCEPTED.pdf]
Preview
Text - Accepted Version
Download (1MB) | Preview

Export

Add to AnyAdd to TwitterAdd to FacebookAdd to LinkedinAdd to PinterestAdd to Email

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics

Actions (login required)

Admin Login Admin Login