Risk factors of emerging adults reporting concurrent use of e-cigarettes with THC/cannabis

ABSTRACT

Objective

Examine the prevalence of concurrent cannabis/THC vaping among those transitioning from high school to college who had ever used e-cigarettes and identify sociodemographic and personal factors associated with risk of cannabis/THC vaping among students in this population.

Participants

Incoming undergraduate students reporting ever using e-cigarettes (N = 529) attending a public university in the southeastern United States.

Methods

Cross-sectional survey administered November 2018. Comparisons of sociodemographic and personal characteristics between those who had vaped cannabis/THC and those who had not were done using chi-square test of association, or Fisher’s exact test or the two-sample t-test. Predictors of cannabis/THC vaping status were determined using logistic regression.

Results

Slightly more than a quarter had ever vaped cannabis/THC (26%). Of those who had ever vaped with cannabis/THC, most said they used cannabis/THC “sometimes” when they vaped (78%). The significant predictors of cannabis/THC vaping status included membership or planned membership in a fraternity or sorority, ever use of alcohol, level of stress, number of five closest friends who currently use marijuana, and whether family member(s) use marijuana.

Discussion

Collaborative tailored prevention and treatment efforts are needed on college campuses to curb vaping/use of cannabis and resulting polysubstance use.

KEYWORDS:

• e-cigarette
• vaping
• electronic nicotine delivery systems
• college health
• cannabis
• marijuana abuse
• THC
• polysubstance use
• emerging adults

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The project described was supported by the NIH National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences through grant number UL1TR001998. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH.