Patrick, Megan E., Miech, Richard A., Carlier, Carola, O'Malley, Patrick M., Johnston, Lloyd D., Schulenberg, John E., and O'Malley, Patrick M
Objective: The study describes the most common reasons for using vaporizers (such as e-cigarettes) among US adolescents and investigates how reasons for use differ by grade, lifetime cigarette use, frequency of vaporizer use, gender, race/ethnicity, and parent education.Method: Data were collected from 4066 students in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grades in 2015 as part of the Monitoring the Future study, a cross-sectional and nationally representative US survey.Results: Common reasons for vaporizer use reported by respondents who had ever used a vaporizer were experimentation (53.0%), taste (37.2%), boredom (23.5%), having a good time (22.4%), and relaxation (21.6%). Reasons differed little across grades or parent education; reasons differed by lifetime use of regular cigarettes, frequency of vaping, gender, and race/ethnicity.Conclusions: Overall, results suggest that decisions to vape are based on curiosity, taste, and pleasure, rather than for reasons such as quitting regular cigarettes or substituting for regular cigarette smoking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]