Vaping Flavors and Flavor Representation: A Test of Youth Risk Perceptions, Novelty Perceptions, and Susceptibility

Whether novelty-flavored vaping devices should be available in the marketplace has been a hotly contested debate. From one perspective, the variety of different flavors, such as fruit and mint, may help adult cigarette smokers who are seeking to switch to reduced-harm nicotine products. However, these flavors are also wildly popular among youth, creating concerns about new nicotine product use among minors.

This experiment (n = 176) tests whether vaping flavors (tobacco vs fruit) and flavor representations on packages (flavor color, flavor image) influence how middle school youth perceive vaping products.

While results show no difference in risk perceptions based on condition, novelty perceptions (eg, how fun, interesting) and susceptibility to vaping are highest among those who view the fruit-flavored vaping product with flavor color and flavor image. Those who viewed this condition reported higher novelty perceptions and susceptibility than those who viewed the fruit-flavored vaping product with no flavor color and no flavor image. Additionally, they reported higher novelty perceptions than those who viewed the tobacco-flavored vaping product with flavor color and flavor image. A post-hoc analysis in supplemental data shows that youth who report lower risk perceptions and higher susceptibility have higher behavioral intentions to vape in the next year.

Findings suggest that restricting flavor representation on packaging might reduce how fun and interesting youth perceive these products to be and how susceptible they are to using them.