Abstract
Background and Aims
Evidence from tobacco research suggests that health warning labels (HWLs) depicting the adverse consequences of consumption change smoking behaviours, with image‐and‐text (also known as ‘pictorial’ or ‘graphic’) HWLs most effective. There is an absence of evidence concerning the potential impact of HWLs placed on alcohol products on selection of those products. This study aimed to obtain a preliminary assessment of the possible impact of (a) image‐and‐text (b) text‐only and (c) image‐only HWLs on selection of alcoholic versus non‐alcoholic drinks.
Design
A between‐subjects randomised experiment with a 2 (image: present vs absent) x 2 (text: present vs absent) factorial design.
Setting
The study was conducted on the online survey platform Qualtrics.
Participants
Participants (n=6024) were adults over the age of 18 who consumed beer or wine regularly (i.e., at least once a week), recruited through a market research agency.
Interventions
Participants were randomised to one of four groups varying in the HWL displayed on the packaging of alcoholic drinks: i. image‐and‐text HWL; ii. text‐only HWL; iii. image‐only HWL; iv. no HWL. HWLs depicted bowel cancer, breast cancer and liver cancer, which were each displayed twice across six alcoholic drinks. Each group viewed six alcoholic and six non‐alcoholic drinks and selected one drink that they would like to consume.
Measurements
The primary outcome was the proportion of participants selecting an alcoholic versus a non‐alcoholic drink.
Findings
Alcoholic drink selection was lower for all HWL types compared with no HWL (image‐and‐text: 56%; image‐only: 49%; text‐only: 61%; no HWL: 77%), with selection lowest for HWLs that included an image. Image‐and‐text HWLs reduced the odds of selecting an alcoholic drink compared with text‐only HWLs (OR = 0.80, 95% CI = 0.69, 0.92), but increased the odds of selecting an alcoholic drink compared with image‐only HWLs (OR = 1.34, 95% CI = 1.16, 1.55).
Conclusions
Health warning labels communicating the increased risk of cancers associated with alcohol consumption reduced selection of alcoholic versus non‐alcoholic drinks in a hypothetical choice task in an online setting; labels displaying images had the largest effect. Their impact in laboratory and real‐world field settings using physical products awaits investigation.
Evidence from tobacco research suggests that health warning labels (HWLs) depicting the adverse consequences of consumption change smoking behaviours, with image‐and‐text (also known as ‘pictorial’ or ‘graphic’) HWLs most effective. There is an absence of evidence concerning the potential impact of HWLs placed on alcohol products on selection of those products. This study aimed to obtain a preliminary assessment of the possible impact of (a) image‐and‐text (b) text‐only and (c) image‐only HWLs on selection of alcoholic versus non‐alcoholic drinks.
Design
A between‐subjects randomised experiment with a 2 (image: present vs absent) x 2 (text: present vs absent) factorial design.
Setting
The study was conducted on the online survey platform Qualtrics.
Participants
Participants (n=6024) were adults over the age of 18 who consumed beer or wine regularly (i.e., at least once a week), recruited through a market research agency.
Interventions
Participants were randomised to one of four groups varying in the HWL displayed on the packaging of alcoholic drinks: i. image‐and‐text HWL; ii. text‐only HWL; iii. image‐only HWL; iv. no HWL. HWLs depicted bowel cancer, breast cancer and liver cancer, which were each displayed twice across six alcoholic drinks. Each group viewed six alcoholic and six non‐alcoholic drinks and selected one drink that they would like to consume.
Measurements
The primary outcome was the proportion of participants selecting an alcoholic versus a non‐alcoholic drink.
Findings
Alcoholic drink selection was lower for all HWL types compared with no HWL (image‐and‐text: 56%; image‐only: 49%; text‐only: 61%; no HWL: 77%), with selection lowest for HWLs that included an image. Image‐and‐text HWLs reduced the odds of selecting an alcoholic drink compared with text‐only HWLs (OR = 0.80, 95% CI = 0.69, 0.92), but increased the odds of selecting an alcoholic drink compared with image‐only HWLs (OR = 1.34, 95% CI = 1.16, 1.55).
Conclusions
Health warning labels communicating the increased risk of cancers associated with alcohol consumption reduced selection of alcoholic versus non‐alcoholic drinks in a hypothetical choice task in an online setting; labels displaying images had the largest effect. Their impact in laboratory and real‐world field settings using physical products awaits investigation.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | Addiction |
| Early online date | 8 Apr 2020 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 8 Apr 2020 |
Keywords
- health warning label
- pictorial health warning label
- alcohol
- graphic warnings
- choice architecture
- cancer
Access to Document
- Full-text PDF (author’s accepted manuscript)
This is the author accepted manuscript (AAM). The final published version (version of record) is available online via Wiley at https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/add.15072 . Please refer to any applicable terms of use of the publisher.