Campaigns and Cliques: Variations in Effectiveness of an Antismoking Campaign as a Function of Adolescent Peer Group Identity

Abstract

Identity-based strategies have been suggested as a way to promote healthy behaviors when traditional approaches fall short. The truth® campaign, designed to reduce smoking in adolescents, is an example of a campaign that uses such a strategy to reach youth described as being outside the mainstream. This article examines the effectiveness of this strategy in promoting antitobacco company beliefs among youth. Survey data from 224 adolescents between 14 and 15 years of age were used to examine whether the truth® campaign was more or less effective at reaching and promoting antitobacco company beliefs among youth who identify with nonmainstream crowds (deviants and counterculture) versus those who identify with mainstream crowds (elites and academics). Analyses revealed that adolescents who identified as deviants and counterculture were more likely to have been persuaded by the truth® campaign. Social identity theory is used as a theoretical framework to understand these effects and to make recommendations for future health campaigns.

Acknowledgments

This article was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program (#18FT-0175).

Notes

^a Delineated by Sussman and colleagues (2007).

^b Identified by Moran (2009); would be considered a deviant according to the perspective of Sussman and colleagues (2007).

Extraction method: maximum likelihood; rotation method: varimax with Kaiser normalization.

^a Reverse coded.

*χ² significant at p < .05.

**χ² significant at p < .01.

**χ² significant at p < .01.

^a Controlling for gender, ethnicity, living with a smoker, perceived smoking norm, sensation seeking, number of hours of TV watched per day, lifetime number of cigarettes smoked, and exposure to other antismoking campaigns.

^b Reverse coded.

*p < .05.