Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, School of Public Health, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, 26505, USA.
Icelandic Center for Social Research and Analysis, Reykjavik University, Reykjavik, Iceland.
Prev Sci. 2018 Aug;19(6):805-812. doi: 10.1007/s11121-017-0825-x.
Electronic cigarette (EC) use continues to increase among adolescents. From a primary prevention point of view, an important gap in our knowledge includes determining whether young smokers that use EC maintain a distinct social profile from kids who use combustible cigarettes (CC). Survey data from middle school students in West Virginia, USA were collected between September and November of 2015 (N = 6547, response rate 84.7%) as part of a state wide school-based mental health intervention program. Data was analyzed using multinomial logistic regression for categorical data. The results show that compared to never smokers, EC-only users possessed a weaker social support and parental monitoring profile and performed worse in school. Additionally, EC-only users were more likely to feel alienated from school, to associate with delinquent peers, to spend time outside late at night, and to engage in unsupervised gatherings with their friends. In 11 of 13 statistical models no difference was observed between EC-only users compared with CC-only users. However, dual users (that had used both EC and CC in their lifetime) demonstrated a significantly greater risk profile compared with EC-only users. We conclude that middle school-aged kids that use EC share a similar risk profile as kids of the same age that use CC. Similar to traditional cigarette smoking, EC use in young adolescents is likely to be a social marker of a pathway to further delinquency and should therefore be subject to primary prevention approaches.
电子烟（EC）在青少年中的使用继续增加。从初级预防的角度来看，我们知识中的一个重要空白是确定使用 EC 的年轻吸烟者是否与使用可燃香烟（CC）的孩子保持独特的社会特征。美国西弗吉尼亚州的中学生在 2015 年 9 月至 11 月期间（N = 6547，回应率为 84.7%）作为全州学校心理健康干预计划的一部分收集了调查数据。使用多项逻辑回归对分类数据进行了数据分析。结果表明，与从不吸烟的人相比，仅使用 EC 的人社会支持和父母监督的状况较弱，在学校的表现也较差。此外，仅使用 EC 的人更有可能感到与学校疏远，与不良少年交往，深夜在外逗留，以及与朋友无人监督地聚会。在 13 个统计模型中的 11 个中，与仅使用 CC 的人相比，仅使用 EC 的人没有观察到差异。然而，双用户（即一生中同时使用过 EC 和 CC）的风险状况与仅使用 EC 的人相比显著增加。我们得出结论，使用 EC 的中学年龄段的孩子与同龄使用 CC 的孩子具有相似的风险特征。与传统吸烟一样，青少年使用 EC 很可能是进一步犯罪的社会标志，因此应采取初级预防措施。
