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. 2018 Nov;63(5):582-586.
doi: 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2018.08.002.

JUUL: Spreading Online and Offline

Kar-Hai Chu  1 , Jason B Colditz  2 , Brian A Primack  2 , Ariel Shensa  2 , Jon-Patrick Allem  3 , Elizabeth Miller  4 , Jennifer B Unger  3 , Tess Boley Cruz  3
Affiliations

JUUL: Spreading Online and Offline

Kar-Hai Chu et al. J Adolesc Health. 2018 Nov.

Abstract

Purpose: The increasing popularity of the JUUL electronic nicotine delivery system among youth poses several potential public health concerns. Social media can be used to better understand the spread of information related to JUUL. This study examined whether adolescents (age < 18) are following JUUL's official Twitter account and subsequently sharing (retweeting) JUUL's posts to their followers. We also assessed various patterns in which adolescents share information on JUUL with each other.

Methods: We collected 3,239 tweets from JUUL's official Twitter account (@JUULVapor) for one full year from February 2017 to January 2018. These tweets were shared by Twitter users to their followers 1,124times by 721 unique users. Users were determined to be either adolescent (age <18) or adult (≥18) based on a systematic procedure involving double coding. We used social network analysis to explore the relationships between users retweeting JUUL.

Results: One-quarter (25%) of users were determined to be adolescents. Social network analysis revealed a maximum path length of 4 and a positive assortativity (r = .29). There were 25 (9%) instances of an adolescent retweeting content from another adolescent, 35 (12%) of an adolescent retweeting from an adult, and 30 (11%) of an adult retweeting from an adolescent.

Conclusions: JUUL's official Twitter account is being followed-and its messages are being shared-by adolescents. Rigorous policies and prevention programs are needed to curb adolescent exposure to JUUL content and discussions online.

Keywords: Adolescent smoking; JUUL; Nicotine; Social media; Social network analysis; Tobacco; e-cigarette.

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Figures

Figure 1:
Figure 1:
JUUL retweet network. Each node (circle) represents someone who retweeted JUUL and each edge (line) represents a follow-and-retweet relationship between two people. The two images are differentiated based on the sensitivity analysis. Red are <18, blue are ≥18, and green are commercial. The left image (A) is color-coded to show the final age value for both 100% agreement and adjudication. The right image (B) shows profiles with disagreements as grey. Node sizes represent the number of connections a given node has (e.g., large nodes have many followers that retweet them). The center node is the JUUL Twitter account, notably large (having many followers that retweet their messages).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment in

  • Promotion of JUUL on Twitter.
    Burton S, Dadich A, Soboleva A. Burton S, et al. J Adolesc Health. 2018 Nov;63(5):525-526. doi: 10.1016/j.jadohealth.2018.08.006. J Adolesc Health. 2018. PMID: 30348275 No abstract available.

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