Logo image
Back
Financial challenges and hardship during the COVID-19 pandemic and tobacco expenditure minimizing strategies among U.S. adult commercial tobacco users
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Financial challenges and hardship during the COVID-19 pandemic and tobacco expenditure minimizing strategies among U.S. adult commercial tobacco users

Kasra Zarei, Kristen Hamilton-Moseley, Julia Chen-Sankey, Lilianna Phan, Aniruddh Ajith, Kiana Hacker, Bambi Jewett and Kelvin Choi
Addictive behaviors, v 138, 107547
01 Mar 2023
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2022.107547
PMID: 36417791
Featured in Collection :   UN Sustainable Development Goals @ Drexel
url
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2022.107547View
Published, Version of Record (VoR) Restricted

Abstract

COVID-19 Financial challenges Hardships Tobacco expenditure minimizing strategies
•Previous research has indicated that tobacco users engage in tobacco expenditure minimizing strategies (TEMS).•TEMS can hinder tobacco cessation especially among at-risk groups including lower income populations.•The COVID-19 pandemic has been a historic period of financial hardships.•The current literature is limited in terms of the impact of COVID-19 financial hardship experiences on TEMS.•We examined increases in TEMS use among adult current and recent former tobacco users in January–February 2021.•Commercial tobacco users, especially those facing financial challenges and hardships, increased TEMS use to manage their expenditures.•This study might influence policy options to reduce TEMS use. Commercial tobacco (CT) users employ tobacco expenditure minimizing strategies (TEMS) to manage their CT expenditures. We examined how financial challenges and hardships during the COVID-19 pandemic relate to increases in TEMS use. Data from a nationally representative sample of 1,700 U.S. adult recent former and current CT users were collected from an online panel during January–February 2021. Participants reported if they had increased use of eight TEMS to save money on CT since the pandemic, and experienced financial challenges (e.g., losing a job) and hardships (e.g., not having enough money to pay for food). The number of financial hardships experienced was counted (range: 0–6). Weighted multivariable logistic regression models were used to examine the associations between financial challenges and hardships and increased TEMS use, adjusting for demographics. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, three TEMS showed the largest increase in use by U.S. adult current and recent former CT users: cutting back (22.4%), finding less expensive places to purchase (15.6%), and buying by bulk (15.5%). Many financial challenges and hardships were consistently associated with increased uses of TEMS. Furthermore, every additional count of financial hardships was associated with higher odds of increasing use of each TEMS (AORs ranging between 1.12 and 1.23). Many CT users increased TEMS use to manage their CT expenditures when facing financial challenges and hardships during the pandemic. This could hinder CT cessation and promote relapse. Prohibiting certain TEMS (e.g., discount coupon and price promotions) may promote CT cessation among this financially vulnerable group.

Metrics

9 Record Views
4 citations in Web of Science
4 citations in Scopus

Details

UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

This publication has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:

#3 Good Health and Well-Being

InCites Highlights

Data related to this publication, from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool:

Collaboration types
Domestic collaboration
Web of Science research areas
Psychology, Clinical
Substance Abuse
Logo image