Electronic-cigarette warnings are effective in discouraging vaping, with warnings specific to health harms being generally more effective than warnings about e-cigarette addiction, according to a meta-analysis of 24 studies conducted by University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers and their colleagues. The researchers also found no negative unintended consequences of e-cigarette warnings, such as encouraging people to smoke cigarettes instead of vaping.

About 2.1 million middle and high school students use e-cigarettes, also known as vaping. Vaping is often advertised as “better” than smoking cigarettes, even though it poses health risks. While anti-smoking campaigns have successfully decreased tobacco use, how to create effective vaping prevention ads remains unclear.

In January 2023, Youjin Jang, Ph.D. student in the Department of Communication and Maria Lapinski, Director of the Michigan State University Health and Risk Communication Center (HRCC) and professor in the Department of Communication, were awarded NSF’s Dissertation Research Improvement Grant. Their study will focus on the risk perception attitude (RPA) framework and aims to understand how anxiety affects how people understand and remember risk information, and the subsequent choices they make.

Researchers in the Health and Risk Communication Center at Michigan State University are using communication modeling and analysis of social media to examine the dynamic relationships between social norms, emotions and COVID-19 risk reduction behaviors, using social media data and self-report surveys.

Youjin Jang was named the inaugural beneficiary of the Sandi Smith Research Fellowship for her master's thesis research on the effect of social norms on behaviors and reactions to potential alcohol-related sexual assault. The $1,000 award will help Jang cover costs related to recruiting and compensating the anticipated 150 participants in the study.