2023/05/02 by Zexin Ma, Rong Ma · 1 voice
Psychology · Arts and Humanities · Medicine · #Behavioral Health and Interventions #Media Influence and Health #Smoking Behavior and Cessation
paper · doi:10.1177/10901981231166696
openalex publication_date 2023/05/02 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/02
Alcohol is a known carcinogen. However, public awareness of cancer risk associated with alcohol use is low. A promising approach to raising awareness is to include cancer warning labels on alcohol-containing products, but there is limited knowledge of the design and effect of such warnings. The present study investigated the impact of visual elements on the effectiveness of cancer warning labels. In a randomized online experiment, alcohol consumers ( N = 1,190) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: exposure to (a) text-only warning labels, (b) pictorial warning labels showing graphic health effects (e.g., diseased organs), and (c) pictorial warning labels showing lived experience (e.g., cancer patients in a medical setting). The results showed that whereas the three warning types did not differ significantly in behavioral intentions, pictorial warnings featuring health effects led to greater disgust and anger than text-only warnings and pictorial warnings featuring lived experience. Moreover, anger predicted lower intentions to reduce alcohol use and was a significant mediator of the effects of warning type on behavioral intentions. The findings highlight the role of emotions in responses to health warning labels with different visual elements and suggest that text-only warnings and pictorial warnings with lived experience may be useful in preventing boomerang effects.