Social media content analysis of electronic cigarette information: Implications for public health ethics – A Brief Report

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to conduct a social media analysis on content related to electronic cigarettes, especially the validity of the information, audience engagement, and emergent ethical issues of health and related information on such a platform. Our results show a majority of the videos on social media platform analyzed were from individuals or organizations for marketing purposes, thus demonstrating a significant gap of needed public health driven content. We further present unique characteristics of popular videos, such as duration, comments, and like to dislike ratios that public health program can mimic to gain acceptance for anti-tobacco initiatives. The lack of information regulation on validity further raises several ethical concerns and we provide recommendations for actions to ensure the audience of such social media platform receive experience an-unbiased view of electronic cigarettes and associated outcomes.