Abstract
There is a gap in knowledge on the affective mechanisms underlying effects of exposure to health misinformation. This study aimed to understand whether discrete emotional responses and perceived relative harm of e-cigarettes versus smoking mediate the effect of exposure to tweets about the harms of e-cigarettes on Twitter and intention to purchase e-cigarettes among adult smokers. We conducted a web-based experiment in November 2019 among 2400 adult smokers who were randomly assigned to view one of four conditions of tweets containing different levels of misinformation. We fitted mediation models using structural equation modeling and bootstrap procedures to assess the indirect effects of exposure to tweets through perceived relative harm of e-cigarettes and six discrete emotions. Our findings support that exposure to tweets about harms of e-cigarettes influence intention to purchase e-cigarettes through perceived relative harm, discrete emotional responses, and serially through emotional responses and perceived relative harm. Feeling worried, hopeful, and happy mediated the effects of condition on intention to purchase e-cigarettes. Feeling scared, worried, angry, and hopeful mediated the effects serially through perceived relative harm. Affective responses and perceived relative harm following exposure to misinformation about e-cigarette harm may mediate the relationship with intention to purchase e-cigarettes among adult smokers.