News and Research Round Up – Counter Tobacco

Welcome to CounterTobacco.org’s new “News and Research Roundup!” Each month we’ll be posting a summary of the latest research, reports, and news stories on counteracting tobacco product sales and marketing at the point of sale (POS). Keeping up with what’s happening in the POS movement all across the country can help you choose policies and strategies that work best for your community. New research can help provide support for your work and evidence for the importance of the “War in the Store.” Have a story you don’t want us to miss? E-mail it to us!

New Research

The associations between exposure to tobacco coupons and predictors of smoking behaviors among US youth, Tobacco Control
- This study found that exposure to tobacco coupons may promote smoking and hinder smoking cessation among youth.
- Learn more about restricting tobacco advertising and promotions that encourage youth smoking uptake.
Oklahoma Retailers’ Perspectives on Mutual Benefit Exchange to Limit Point-of-Sale Tobacco Advertisement, Health Promotion Practice
- This qualitative exploratory study examined how retailers view the idea of limiting POS advertisements in exchange for business benefits. This mutual benefit exchange approach, which focuses on voluntary retailer action, could enable local tobacco control action in states where preemption limits legislative action and provide an additional option for states with strong opposition to implementing POS legislation.
- Learn more about the Deadly Alliance between the tobacco retailers and convenience stores.
Bridging the Gap between Science and Law: The Example of Tobacco Regulatory Science, The Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics
Manipulative Marketing at the First Amendment, Georgetown Law Journal
An intervention to reduce the number of convenience stores selling tobacco: feasibility study, Tobacco Control
- The study examined how willing convenience store owners in Auckland, New Zealand would be to stop selling tobacco products or sell NRTs if given the incentive of promotion of their stores. Given that 93% of stores were unwilling to stop or restrict tobacco sales, reducing tobacco retailers may require legislative policy solutions along with community support.
Trends in annual sales and current use of cigarettes, cigars, roll-your-own tobacco, pipes, and smokeless tobacco among US adults, 2002-2012, Tobacco Control
- Cigarette sales per capita dropped 2002-2012, while sales increased for cigars, loose tobacco, and moist snuff.
Receptivity to cigarette and tobacco control messages and adolescent smoking initiation, Tobacco Control
- This study provides evidence that tobacco control advertisments can counteract the influence of tobacco adverisements in promoting youth and adolescent smoking behavior. Inidviduals who were receptive to cigarette advertisemtnes were also receptive to tobacco control advertisements.
A comparison of three policy approaches for tobacco retailer reduction, Preventive Medicine
- This study found that policies prohibiting sales of tobacco products in pharmacies or stores with a pharmacy counter, policies restricting sales of tobacco products within 1000 ft of schools, and policies regulating to 500 ft the minimum allowable distance between tobacco outlets would reduce tobacco retailer density on a state-wide level by 13.9% – 22.1% if implemented in North Carolina. Any one of these policies would reduce tobacco retailer density by 11.7% – 27.9% at the county level as well.
- Learn more about licensing and zoning policies that can effectively reduce tobacco retailer density.

Warning Labels

Young Adult Smokers’ and Prior-Smokers’ Evaluations of Novel Tobacco Warning Images, Nicotine & Tobacco Research
- This survey conducted with 18-34 year olds recruited from Google Consumer Survey’s Australian panel of Android model phone users found that regardless of smoking status, participants rated messages that featured harm to children as the most effective, while they rated industry denormalization messages and messages about adult second-hand smoke as least effective.
- News Story: Youth who receive tobacco coupons may be more susceptible to smoking, Reuters
- Learn more about POS health warnings
Do Young Adults Perceive That Cigarette Graphic Warnings Provide New Knowledge About the Harms of Smoking?, Annals of Behavioral Medicine
- News Story: Those gross, graphic warnings on cigarette labels? This study shows they actually work, Vox
Educational differences in the impact of pictorial cigarette warning labels on smokers: findings from the International Tobacco Control (ITC) Europe surveys,Tobacco Control
- Examining the impact of pictorial warning labels, researchers found greater avoidance among low and moderate education smokers in France and the UK, but not greater salience of the warning among smokers.
Editorial: Scanning the brain for answers about effectiveness of graphic warning labels, Tobacco Control
Pictorial cigarette pack warnings: a meta-analysis, Tobacco Control
- This meta-analysis found that the literature supports that pictorial warning labels are more effective than text-only warning labels. Across 37 studies, pictorial warnings were found to attract and hold individuals attention better, elicit both stronger reactions and more negative attitudes towards smoking and cigarette packs, and increase quit intentions or intentions not to start smoking.

Other Tobacco Products

The effects of electronic cigarette marketing on intended use in college students, Addition and Behavior
- This study suggests that e-cigarette advertisements, as well as the belief that e-cigarettes are not as addictive as regular cigarettes may promote the uptake of e-cigarette use.
- Read more about e-cigarettes at the point of sale.
Marketing Practices of Vapor Store Owners, American Journal of Public Health
- This study of the marketing tactics employed by vapor stores in a metropolitan area in Oklahoma found that stores use tactics similar to both those currently utilized by the tobacco industry and those now restricted strategies that the tobacco industry has used in the past. However, their smaller budgets limit use of radio and television advertisements, and most of their marketing budgets were spend outside of the store locations rather than at the POS.
Flavor chemicals in electronic cigarette fluids, Tobacco Control
- News story: Is Smoking Cherry E-Cigarettes Riskier Than Eating Cherry Candy? Bloomberg Business\