UC Merced

Existing literature examining perceptions of nicotine addiction are largely surface level questions or fail to align with diagnostic criteria of tobacco use disorder. The disentanglement of the physical, psychological, and social components of nicotine addiction are needed to better understand what addiction means to people. Understanding how the lay person views and thinks about nicotine addiction may provide insight into non-smokers initiation intentions, smokers consumption habits, and quit intentions. This study developed and validated a novel scale assessing perceptions of nicotine addiction that comprehensively aligns with the clinical dimensions of nicotine addiction. To establish the scale’s construct validity, this study utilized cognitive interviews for item development, exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and psychometric evaluation for scale development, and assessed convergent, discriminant, and criterion validity for scale evaluation. The proposed scale returned adequate diagnostics using psychometric evaluation and its construct validity was established using three assessments of validity. The findings from this study suggest that perceptions of nicotine addiction may not align with clinical dimensions of addiction, and that public health education efforts should focus on the experiences of addiction rather than emphasizing the consequences of addiction.