Policy influences on adolescent risk perceptions of vaping

Electronic nicotine delivery system (ENDS) use by youth remains a significant public health concern. Perceived risk is an important predictor of adolescent ENDS use. While state policies have been shown to affect ENDS use, and perceived risk is inversely associated with use, whether policies shape adolescent risk perceptions remains less well studied.

We used longitudinal (2013-2019) US adolescent data from the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health study-a population-based sample of adolescents enrolled between ages 12 and 17-and state policy data for ENDS and tobacco policies. Hybrid within-person and between-person panel models estimated associations of policies with three outcomes: perceived harms of ENDS, perceived risk of addiction and perceived risk of ENDS compared with smoking.

Within-person findings revealed that ENDS purchase age restrictions were associated with increased odds of reporting categories of greater perceived harm (OR=1.65), perceived risk of addiction (OR=1.14) and risk relative to smoking (OR=1.60). Similarly, smoking bans were associated with perceived harm (OR=1.33), perceived risk of addiction (OR=1.21) and risk relative to smoking (OR=1.36). Between-person models indicated that ENDS excise taxes and purchase age restrictions, as well as smoking bans, were associated with all three perceived risk outcomes.

Implementing smoking bans, excise taxes and purchase age restrictions may present an avenue to heighten perceived risk among youth. As such, policies may enhance prevention of initiation and improve interventions for youth who vape. Further, as greater duration of exposure to policies is associated with increased risk perceptions, maintaining consistently strong policies is important.