Innovative Web-Based Intervention for Smoking Cessation Among College Students

Summary

Tobacco use is the leading cause of cancer death in the U.S. Because smokers who quit by age 30 have cancer death risk similar to non-smokers, promoting cessation early in life is critical. U.S. colleges/universities, enrolling \>14 million students/year (40% of those aged 18 to 24), are an important venue to reach young adult smokers. While daily tobacco use in the U.S. has declined to 18.1%, nondaily smoking (smoking on some days but not every day) is increasing, particularly among young adults and African Americans. Moreover, young smokers and nondaily smokers (half of young adult smokers), respectively, are less likely to seek help in quitting; thus, innovative strategies are needed to assist cessation early in life, particularly among those who may not be motivated to quit or seek help. Unfortunately, no research has focused on developing a cessation intervention that addresses a broad range of smoking patterns (nondaily to daily smoking) or diverse campus settings among ethnically diverse student populations. Web-based interventions offer promise in helping college students to quit, given high rates of Internet use and web capacity to provide tailored cessation messages. A novel approach to delivering cessation information via the web might be to address broader lifestyle issues and apply market research strategies to identify market segments of smokers (groups of people with similar interests, goals, values) in order to target and engage these groups more effectively. Applying this strategy to an online cessation intervention should enhance both intervention use and processing of intervention messages, leading to greater abstinence rates. The investigators aim to: (1) develop and refine a tailored web-based intervention for smoking cessation targeting college students with a range of smoking levels; (2) test the usability, acceptability, and feasibility of the intervention among college student smokers; and (3) determine the potential effect of the intervention on smoking cessation, smoking level, quit attempts, and contextual factors.

Conditions

• Tobacco Use Cessation
• Cigarette Smoking

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Online intervention arm

See online intervention arm

BEHAVIORAL

Online control arm

See online control arm

Sponsors & Collaborators

• National Institutes of Health (NIH)

  collaborator NIH

• Georgia State University

  collaborator OTHER

• Valdosta State University

  collaborator OTHER

• Emory University

  lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

SINGLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

30 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2013-01-31

Primary Completion

2013-07-31

Completion

2013-07-31

Countries

• United States

Study Locations