Public Reactions to the New York State Policy on Flavored Electronic Cigarettes on Twitter: Observational Study

Abstract

Background Flavored electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) have become popular in recent years, especially among youth and young adults. To address the epidemic of e-cigarettes, New York State approved a ban on sales of most flavored vaping products other than tobacco and menthol flavors on September 17, 2019. Objective This study aims to examine the attitude of Twitter users to the policy on flavored e-cigarettes in New York State and the impact of this policy on public perceptions of e-cigarettes. This study also compares the attitudes and topics between New York Twitter users and Twitter users from other states who were not directly affected by this policy. Methods Tweets related to e-cigarettes and the New York State policy on flavored e-cigarettes were collected using the Twitter streaming application programming interface from June 2019 to December 2019. Tweets from New York State and those from other states that did not have a flavored e-cigarette policy were extracted. Sentiment analysis was applied to analyze the proportion of negative and positive tweets about e-cigarettes or the flavor policy. Topic modeling was applied to e-cigarette–related data sets and New York flavor policy–related data sets to identify the most frequent topics before and after the announcement of the New York State policy. Results We found that the average number of tweets related to e-cigarettes and the New York State policy on flavored e-cigarettes increased in both New York State and other states after the flavor policy announcement. Sentiment analysis revealed that after the announcement of the New York State flavor policy, in both New York State and other states, the proportion of negative tweets on e-cigarettes increased from 34.07% (4531/13,299) to 44.58% (18,451/41,390) and from 32.48% (14,320/44,090) to 44.40% (64,262/144,734), respectively, while positive tweets decreased significantly from 39.03% (5191/13,299) to 32.86% (13,601/41,390) and from 42.78% (18,863/44,090) to 33.93% (49,105/144,734), respectively. The majority of tweets related to the New York State flavor policy were negative both before and after the announcement of this policy in both New York (87/98, 89% and 3810/4565, 83.46%, respectively) and other states (200/255, 78.4% and 12,695/15,569, 81.54%, respectively), while New York State had a higher proportion of negative tweets than other states. Topic modeling results demonstrated that teenage vaping and health problems were the most discussed topics associated with e-cigarettes. Conclusions Public attitudes toward e-cigarettes became more negative on Twitter after New York State announced the policy on flavored e-cigarettes. Twitter users in other states that did not have such a policy on flavored e-cigarettes paid close attention to the New York State flavor policy. This study provides some valuable information about the potential impact of the flavored e-cigarettes policy in New York State on public attitudes toward flavored e-cigarettes.

Investigating the Impact of the New York State Flavor Ban on e-Cigarette–Related Discussions on Twitter: Observational Study

“…Twitter is a popular social media platform in the United States, with many users being teenagers and young adults [ 34 ]. In addition, previous studies successfully used Twitter data to study public perceptions of e-cigarette and e-cigarette–related policies [ 35 , 36 ]. In this study, we compared the sentiment and topic changes in e-cigarette–related tweets over time.…”

Electronic cigarette users’ reactions and responses to a hypothetical ban of flavoured electronic cigarette liquids

“…Other studies examining tobacco flavour bans have also described negative sentiment towards flavour bans but limited evidence for unintended consequences. Similar to the negative reaction to the flavour limitation cluster, analyses of Twitter posts related to a flavour ban in New York State found that a vast majority of posts before and after an imposed flavour ban were negative 38. While there is often mixed sentiment regarding support for a flavour ban,18 many tobacco users report intentions to quit following a flavour ban 20.…”

“…Similar to the negative reaction to the flavour limitation cluster, analyses of Twitter posts related to a flavour ban in New York State found that a vast majority of posts before and after an imposed flavour ban were negative. 38 While there is often mixed sentiment regarding support for a flavour ban, 18 many tobacco users report intentions to quit following a flavour ban. 20 Additionally, analyses of behaviours after tobacco product flavour ban implementation suggest tobacco use decreases after ban implementation 23 39 40 with minimal unintended consequences, such as ‘black market’ purchasing behaviours.…”

Perceptions of Oral Nicotine Pouches on Reddit: Observational Study

“…In addition to analyzing the major topics discussed in each post, we performed sentiment analysis with the standard “positive,” “neutral,” and “negative” categories [ 18 - 22 ]. Example Reddit posts in each topic and subtopic category with different sentiments are shown in Multimedia Appendix 2 .…”