ArticleTobacco control2020
Social media use by leading US e-cigarette, cigarette, smokeless tobacco, cigar and hookah brands.
Article in Tobacco control, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 76 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
76 citing papers in PubMed, 120 citations in OpenAlex.
- The Fuetsan Manhoben Curriculum: Effects on Risk Perceptions and Intentions Regarding Tobacco and Betel Nut Use Among Adolescents in Guam.Substance use & misuse · 2026Trial
- Mobile Text Messaging for Tobacco Risk Communication Among Young Adult Community College Students: Randomized Trial of Project Debunk.JMIR mHealth and uHealth · 2021Trial
- The role of social media influencer promotion in initiation and use of cigar, little cigar, cigarillo, and cannabis products among US youth and young adults: Using exogenous marketing exposure measures.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2026Article
- Monitoring of tobacco product marketing for rapid public health surveillance in the United States.Preventive medicine reports · 2026Article
- Causal effect estimates of online e-cigarette marketing exposure on future e-cigarette harm perception and use.Drug and alcohol dependence reports · 2026Article
- Tobacco use patterns and the social environment among university students in southern Ecuador.Frontiers in public health · 2026Observational
- Waterpipe tobacco smoking: an urgent public health concern among adolescents and young adults.Annals of medicine and surgery (2012) · 2026Article
- An Experimental Study on the Effect of E-Cigarette Advertising Features on Youth Perceptions and Intentions.Substance use & misuse · 2026Article
- Perceptions of e-Cigarettes and Heated Tobacco Products Among Never Users of Nicotine in the European Union.Nicotine & tobacco research : official journal of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco · 2025Article
- The Impact of Cigarillo Text Warning Presence and Size on Young Adults' Cigarillo Risk Beliefs, Knowledge, Appeal, and Use Intentions.Nicotine & tobacco research : official journal of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco · 2025Article
- Across the world availability of flavour accessories for tobacco products.Tobacco control · 2025Article
- Large Language Models' Accuracy in Emulating Human Experts' Evaluation of Public Sentiments about Heated Tobacco Products on Social Media: Evaluation Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Protecting historically marginalized groups or targeted marketing? A computational analysis of individuals engaging with public and protected cigar-branded tweets.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2025Article
- Identifying the Determinants of Hookah Smoking Among the Youth; A Mixed-Methods Study.Journal of community health · 2024Article
- Tobacco and Alcohol Content in Top Vietnamese YouTube Music Videos: Content Analysis.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Article
- Social Media Marketing Strategies for Electronic Cigarettes: Content Analysis of Chinese Weibo Accounts.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Article
- Exposure to nicotine pouch marketing and nicotine pouch experimentation among U.S. adults who use commercial tobacco.Preventive medicine reports · 2024Article
- Industry marketing of tobacco products on social media: case study of Philip Morris International's IQOS.Tobacco control · 2024Article
- Article
- The Effect of Cigarette Content Marketing on Students' Smoking Behavior and Decisions: A PLS-SEM Approach.Asian Pacific journal of cancer prevention : APJCP · 2024Article
16 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundYouth and young adults frequently use social media and are susceptible to tobacco use. This study is the first to provide a systematic overview of how leading tobacco product brands use popular social media platforms.
methodsWe identified 112 leading brands of e-cigarettes, hookah, cigars, cigarettes and smokeless tobacco based on sales and self-report user data. We searched for each brand on six platforms: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest and Tumblr. In early 2019, we conducted a content analysis of each page, coding: age restrictions, warning display, page characteristics and post characteristics.
resultsCigarette brands were generally not present. Most e-cigarettes, hookah and cigar brands had pages on at least two platforms. One-third of smokeless brands had pages on at least one platform. Few brands had pages on Pinterest and Tumblr. Most pages had existed for 3-5 years. Overall, brand pages rarely used age gating, did not display health warnings, generally posted images of a product alone and often used hashtags unrelated to tobacco. Brands commonly used special features like ephemeral posts on Instagram and pop-up chat windows on Facebook. Many pages displayed images of young people and mentioned flavour. Median followers per brand ranged from about 1 000-10 000, and total followers summed across brands reached over 5 million on Facebook and Instagram alone.
conclusionsLeading brands of most tobacco product types use social media extensively. Several findings identify issues related to youth exposure to and appeal of tobacco social media marketing. Findings can inform tobacco education efforts and regulation.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.