Purpose: To determine the association between exposure to FDA's Fresh Empire tobacco public education campaign and tobacco-related beliefs.
Design: Repeated cross-sectional data collection design with embedded longitudinal cohort over six data collection waves.
Setting: 30 US evaluation markets.
Sample: Hip Hop peer crowd-identified US youth aged 12-18 (N = 5,378).
Measures: Self-reported brand and video ad awareness (saw any ad at least sometimes) and perceived effectiveness (1-5 scale) to describe campaign awareness and receptivity. Exogenous exposure was measured using population-adjusted broadcast and digital video impressions. Tobacco-related beliefs included beliefs about smoking risks, attitudes towards tobacco-free people and lifestyles, and normative beliefs about smoking.
Analysis: Descriptive analyses of awareness, receptivity, and agreement with tobacco-related beliefs. Logistic regression models to determine the relationship between broadcast and digital video impressions and beliefs.
Intervention: Fresh Empire campaign.
Results: The campaign generated a high level of reach (71% brand and 66% video ad awareness at final wave) and messages were well-received (across waves 3.5-4.1 mean perceived effectiveness scores). Higher broadcast television exposure was associated with increased agreement with five beliefs related to addiction/control, being a bad influence on family/friends, and cosmetic effects of smoking (breath and attractiveness) (ORs = 1.16-1.27, (Ps < .05)).
Conclusion: Fresh Empire successfully reached and resonated with Hip Hop-identified youth. The campaign was associated with a limited number of targeted beliefs.
Keywords: adolescent; mass media campaign; tobacco control.