The role of information avoidance in managing uncertainty from conflicting recommendations about electronic cigarettes

Abstract

Insufficient scientific evidence about electronic cigarettes (ecigarettes) has led to conflicting recommendations (CRs) by credible scientific organizations, creating a public health debate that could prove especially difficult to reconcile as current and former smokers make decisions about whether to use e-cigarettes. To investigate how CRs about e-cigarettes may affect intentions to engage in healthy behaviors, 717 former and current smokers were randomly exposed to one of five conditions (varying in the level of conflict in recommendations) in this between-subject experiment. Our results indicated a significant interaction between the message level of conflict and individuals' information avoidance, employed to maintain hope and deniability. These results suggest the effects of CRs stemming from scientific uncertainty vary with subgroups of people, pointing to several pressing theoretical and practical implications.

Will E-Cigarette Modified Risk Messages with a Nicotine Warning Polarize Smokers’ Beliefs about the Efficacy of Switching Completely to E-Cigarettes in Reducing Smoking-Related Risks?

“…Nonetheless, we found that need for closure and people’s initial efficacy beliefs worked in tandem to influence message response: MRMs with a nicotine warning only enhanced efficacy beliefs of smokers with low initial efficacy beliefs and low need for closure. Consistent with a recent study [ 25 ], this suggests the importance of considering individuals’ motivational and cognitive differences in the assessment of mixed communication surrounding e-cigarettes.…”

“…In another experiment [ 24 ], 2056 U.S. adults reported no differences between conflicting e-cigarette messages and control messages whereas positive and negative e-cigarette messages produced responses consistent with the messages. Very recently, scholars [ 25 ] found that personal characteristics impacted people’s responses to e-cigarette messages mentioning both positive and negative product effects. Specifically, among those with a low information avoidance tendency, exposure to conflicting e-cigarette information produced more confusion than one-sided anti-e-cigarette messages or control messages.…”

“…Specifically, based on the biased assimilation and opinion polarization literature, we examined if smokers who initially differed in their perceived efficacy of switching completely to e-cigarettes in reducing smoking-related risks would become stronger in their beliefs after exposure to MRMs with a nicotine warning. Additionally, following Yang and colleagues [ 25 ] and prior studies on biased assimilation of mixed health communication [ 28 , 29 ], we examined another personality variable, need for closure, in the interplay of initial e-cigarette efficacy beliefs and MRMs with a nicotine warning on smokers’ posttest perceived e-cigarette efficacy in reducing smoking-related health risks.…”

“…Additionally, need for closure is an important epistemic motivational variable [ 42 ] and may play an important role in the perceptions of modified risk communication and advertisements. Recently, scholars [ 25 ] found that smokers’ information avoidance tendency was closely related to their responses to e-cigarette mixed messages. Need for closure has long been discussed as an important variable related to individuals’ information acquisition tendencies and behaviors [ 45 , 47 , 48 , 49 ].…”

Information avoidance during health crises: Predictors of avoiding information about the COVID-19 pandemic among german news consumers

“…Despite the positive and negative consequences of information avoidance on effective coping behaviors and crisis management, information avoidance has received less attention than other coping strategies such as information seeking ( Brashers et al., 2002 ; Yang et al., 2020 ). The prevalence and predictors of avoidance are not well-understood ( Emanuel et al., 2015 ; Narayan et al., 2011 ).…”