Incentive-based and Media Literacy Informed Approaches to Improve Vaping Cessation

Summary

This study aims to evaluate the feasibility and compare the preliminary effect of vaping cessation program consisting of media literacy education and real-time text messaging support and leverage insights from behavioral economics to enhance social and financial incentives to improve program engagement, and eventually abstinence. Our hypotheses are that 1) the Combined arm is associated with improved vaping abstinence to the Media literacy and Financial incentive arms; and 2) the financial incentive-related arms (either Combined or Financial incentive) enhance engagement compared to the non-incentive related arms.

Conditions

• Behavior, Health Risk
• Implementation Science
• E Cigarette Use
• Cessation, Smoking
• Incentives
• Engagement, Patient
• Peer Support
• Media Literacy

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Text-massaging suport

Text-messaging quitting support program (i.e., This is Quitting) is an evidence-based, free mobile program from Truth Initiative designed to help young people quit vaping. The program is fully automated and interactive. To establish or reinforce perceived social norms and social support around quitting, a majority of messages come from other users who have submitted them to the program.

BEHAVIORAL

Financial incentive

1. Participants will earn $3 for each saliva cotinine sample submission regardless of positive or negative results after the quit day (an assessments at Week 6, Week 8, Week 10, and Week 12, during the abstinence phase) 2. Participants will earn additional escalating rewards for each negative sample- $7 for Week 6, $12 for Week 8, $17 for Week 10, and $22 for Week 12 (2 months after the target quit date). The bonus starts at $7 and increase by $5 for each subsequent negative cotinine sample (i.e., $7, $12, $17, and $22). 3. A reset contingency will be used. That is the reward amount will be returned back to original $7 if there is a missing or positive saliva cotinine sample

BEHAVIORAL

Media literacy

Media literacy e-learning lessons cover topics regarding what e-cigarettes are and how they work, how nicotine and nicotine addiction affects the brain and behavior, how to prepare to quit vaping, developing a quit plan and how to deal with cravings and relapse. The program focuses on changing knowledge, attitudes and beliefs related to e-cigarette use, as well as emphasizing vaping related media literacy.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS)

  collaborator NIH

• University of Nebraska

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Tzeyu Michaud, PhD · University of Nebraska

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

DOUBLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

19 Years

Max Age

29 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2023-12-07

Primary Completion

2024-11-01

Completion

2025-06-30

Countries

• United States

Study Locations