Active Research
Evaluating nutrition labeling policy changes in the US and Mexico
This study use interrupted time series design with surveys in Mexico and the US, including an oversample of Mexican Americans, to evaluate Mexico’s innovative front of package food labeling policy.
Funding Agency: National Institute of Diabetes, Digestive, and Kidney Diseases/NIH (R01 DK128967)
PI: James F. Thrasher (with Rachel E. Davis)
Dates: 08/2021 – 07/2025
Evaluation of cigarette package inserts for enhanced communication with smokers
The tobacco industry has used cigarette package inserts to communicate with smokers for over a century. Currently, Canada is the only country that has used inserts for communication cessation messages among smokers. The FDA has regulatory power to adopt inserts for communicating with smokers, but more research is needed to determine this effective. These prospective experimental and pre/post policy studies integrate ecological momentary assessment to evaluate whether inserts with efficacy messages promote smoking cessation.
Funding Agency: National Cancer Institute/NIH (R01 CA215466)
PI: James F. Thrasher
Dates: 1/2019 – 12/2024
Global Cancer Disparities Administrative Supplement for Evaluation of cigarette package inserts for enhanced communication with smokers
This study uses ecological momentary assessment to identify cultural and social network characteristics that lead Mexican and Mexican American smokers to talk with others about smoking cessation messages, which
Funding Agency: National Cancer Institute/NIH (R01 CA215466-S1)
PI: James F. Thrasher
Dates: 10/2020 – 12/2023
Little cigar and cigarillo warnings to reduce tobacco-related cancers and disease
Research on effective warning labels for cigarettes is well established, but little is known about effective warnings for cigarillos and little cigars, which are increasingly popular in the US. This project will develop and evaluate the effectiveness of warning labels for cigarillos and little cigars through a series of online experiments.
Funding agency: National Cancer Institute/NIH (PI Adam Goldstein, R01 CA240732)
People: Jim Thrasher (Co-Investigator).
New consumer warnings to counter reassurance- based tobacco marketing
This project involves qualitative studies and experiments to develop and evaluate how warning label and campaign messages can counter reassurance-based tobacco marketing (e.g., filters, tobacco descriptors) among Australian smokers.
Funding agency: Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (PI M Wakefield, GNT1142981)
People: Jim Thrasher (Co-Investigator)
International food policy study: Evaluating the impact of food labelling, marketing, and fiscal nutrition policies
Food labelling is a broad-reaching strategy to help consumers make informed decisions about the nutritional content of the food they buy. Countries have adopted different labeling policies, and this study is evaluating the impact of these policies on dietary behaviors between and within countries (Australia, Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, the United States).
Research activities: From 2018 – 2024, we are conducting annual cross-sectional surveys of approximately 4,500 adults in Australia, Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, the United States.
Funding Agency: Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Project Grant (PI Hammond)
People: Jim Thrasher (Co-Investigator), Rachel Davis, Gabriela Armendariz, Yoojin Cho, Emily
Loud, Adebusola Ogunnaike
Completed Research (Selected Projects)
Building the evidence for effective and sustainable cigarette warning label policy.
This project used quasi-experimental and experimental designs among adult smokers in Mexico, Australia, Canada, and the US to determine the characteristics of pictorial health warning labels with maximum impact on quit-related cognitions, affect & behavior, assessing factors associated with differential wear-out of effects.
Funding: National Cancer Institute/NIH (PI Thrasher, R01 CA167067)
Dates: 07/01/2012 – 04/30/2018
Assessing transnational spillover effects of Mexico's front-of-package nutritional labeling system among Mexican Americans in the US.
In 2020, Mexico implemented innovative front-of-package nutrition warning labels (FoPWLs) for packaged foods to increase the salience and understanding of nutrition information. This study evaluated Mexican Americans' self-reported exposure to
Mexican FoPWLs and self-reported effects of FoPWLs on purchasing behavior through surveying online panels of adult Mexican Americans to self-reprort on buying food at Mexican-oriented stores. Many Mexican Americans report both exposure to Mexican FOPWLs and reducing purchases of unhealthy foods because of them.
Funding Agency: National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disorders of the National Institutes of Health (R01 DK128967)
People: James F Thrasher, Victor Eduardo Villalobos-Daniel, Dai Fang, Claudia Nieto, Christine
M White, Gabriela Armendariz, Alejandra Jáuregui, David Hammond, Rachel E Davis
Combining inserts with warning labels on cigarette packs to promote smoking cessation: A 2-week randomized trial.
Cigarette pack inserts with messages on cessation benefits and advice are a promising labeling policy that may help promote smoking cessation. This study aimed to assess insert effects, with and without accompanying pictorial health warning labels(HWLs), on hypothesized psychosocial and behavioral outcomes through conduction of a 2 x 2 between-subject randomized trial (inserts with efficacy messages vs. no inserts; large pictorial HWLs vs. small text HWLs), with 367 adults who smoked at least 10 cigarettes a day over a 2 week period. This study provides some evidence, albeit limited, that pack inserts with efficacy messages can promote behaviors that predict smoking cessation attempts.
Funding Agency: National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health (R01 CA215466)
People: James F Thrasher, Stuart G Ferguson, Emily E Hackworth, Chung-Li Wu, Victoria C Lambert, Norman Porticella, Minji Kim, James W Hardin, Jeff Niederdeppe