Availability, appeal, and addictiveness by design: Tobacco and nicotine industry deliberate targeting of youth

Raglan Maddox; Becky Freeman; Charlotta Pisinger; Emily Banks

doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1005133

Availability, appeal, and addictiveness by design: Tobacco and nicotine industry deliberate targeting of youth

Raglan Maddox^*, Becky Freeman, Charlotta Pisinger, Emily Banks

^*Corresponding author for this work

www.ccrp.dk

Abstract

Contemporary tobacco and nicotine products, particularly e-cigarettes, are deliberately designed, marketed, and distributed to maximize youth appeal, uptake, dependence, and use. Youth uptake is a predictable outcome of systems designed to maximize product availability, appeal, and addictiveness.

Original language	English
Article number	e1005133
Journal	PLOS Medicine
Volume	23
Issue number	5
ISSN	1549-1277
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmed.1005133
Publication status	Published - May 2026

Keywords

Humans
Tobacco Industry/methods
Adolescent
Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems
Nicotine
Tobacco Products/adverse effects
Adolescent Behavior
Behavior, Addictive

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10.1371/journal.pmed.1005133Licence: CC BY

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abstract = "Contemporary tobacco and nicotine products, particularly e-cigarettes, are deliberately designed, marketed, and distributed to maximize youth appeal, uptake, dependence, and use. Youth uptake is a predictable outcome of systems designed to maximize product availability, appeal, and addictiveness.",

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AU - Freeman, Becky

AU - Pisinger, Charlotta

AU - Banks, Emily

N1 - Copyright: © 2026 Maddox et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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KW - Tobacco Industry/methods

KW - Adolescent

KW - Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems

KW - Nicotine

KW - Tobacco Products/adverse effects

KW - Adolescent Behavior

KW - Behavior, Addictive

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ER -

Availability, appeal, and addictiveness by design: Tobacco and nicotine industry deliberate targeting of youth

Abstract

Keywords

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