Abstract
BackgroundTobacco use remains the leading cause of premature morbidity and mortality in the United States. Young adults are less successful at quitting, use cessation treatment less often than smokers of other ages, and can be a challenge to retain in treatment. Social media, integrated into the lives of many young adults, represents a promising strategy to deliver evidence-based smoking cessation treatment to a large, diverse audience. The goal of this trial is to test the efficacy of a stage-based smoking cessation intervention on Facebook for young adults age 18 to 25 on smoking abstinence, reduction in cigarettes smoked, and thoughts about smoking abstinence.Methods/DesignThis is a randomized controlled trial. Young adult smokers throughout the United States are recruited online and randomized to either the 3 month Tobacco Status Project intervention on Facebook or a referral to a smoking cessation website. The intervention consists of assignment to a secret Facebook group tailored to readiness to quit smoking (precontemplation, contemplation, preparation), daily Facebook contacts tailored to readiness to quit smoking, weekly live counseling sessions, and for those in preparation, weekly Cognitive Behavioral Therapy counseling sessions on Facebook. Primary outcome measure is biochemically-verified 7-day point prevalence abstinence from smoking at posttreatment (3 months), 6, and 12 months. Secondary outcome measures are reduction of 50 % or more in cigarettes smoked, 24 h quit attempts, and commitment to abstinence at each time point. A secondary aim is to test, within the TSP condition, the effect of a monetary incentive at increasing engagement in the intervention.DiscussionThis randomized controlled trial is testing a novel Facebook intervention for treating young adults’ tobacco use. If efficacious, the social media intervention could be disseminated widely and expanded to address additional health risks.Trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov: NCT02207036, May 13, 2014.
Highlights
Tobacco use remains the leading cause of premature morbidity and mortality in the United States
Social support and convenience were identified as strengths of a Facebook intervention, while privacy was the main concern [35]. Based on this formative work, we developed the Tobacco Status Project (TSP), a Facebook intervention for young adult smokers combining Facebook contacts tailored to participants’ readiness to quit smoking with a 12-week cessation program consisting of 90 days of Facebook postings, weekly counseling sessions, and for those ready to quit, 7 state-of-the-art group cognitive-behavioral sessions
We describe a randomized controlled trial testing the efficacy of TSP against a referral control condition with 480 young adult smokers who use Facebook
Summary
This is the first clinical trial of a smoking cessation intervention for young adults delivered entirely through Facebook. Intervention through social media is innovative and a good option to reach young adult smokers, given widespread use and integration into the lives of users [19] Intervention using this medium can be complicated with respect to recruitment and study design. Investigators have gone to great efforts to ensure that the exchange of information is this trial is used to make positive life changes with the support of an intimate network, and that limitations to privacy and confidentiality are clear to participants. This trial will help to determine whether and how social media can be harnessed for long-term, biochemically verified smoking cessation in young adults. JP is Associate Professor of Medicine with the Stanford Prevention Research Center
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