Alcohol and Cancer Messaging: A Scoping Review

Public health messaging is a key strategy for raising awareness of the alcohol-cancer link. This review summarizes research on messages communicating this link. Eligible studies were in English, involved human participants, and assessed messages about alcohol and cancer. A systematic search was conducted in July 2021 and updated in July 2023 across seven databases (PubMed/MEDLINE, Cochrane Library, Embase, Scopus, CINHAL, Web of Science, and PsycInfo) using keywords for alcohol, cancer, and messaging. Two coders independently screened and extracted data from eligible studies using Covidence. We identified 121 studies from 104 articles, yielding 236 alcohol-cancer messages. Most studies were published within the past decade (n = 80, 66%) and assessed alcohol beverage warning labels referencing cancer (n = 75, 62%). Most studies included adults who consumed alcohol (n = 85, 70%). Men comprised less than 50% of the sample in half of the studies. Breast cancer was the most mentioned cancer in messages (n = 85, 36%). Messages commonly used probabilistic causal language expressing uncertainty in the outcome [e.g., "alcohol increases cancer risk" (n = 149, 63%)]. Understanding public awareness of cancer-relevant health behaviors is critical to cancer prevention and control. Messages about the carcinogenic effects of alcohol can be an effective public health strategy if rigorously tested across broad populations.