April 4-6, 2024 • Hyatt Regency • Lexington, KY
Innovations in Health Communication
Innovations in Health Communication
Abstract: A Survey Study on the Impact of Moral Foundations, Norms, and Social Media Exposure on Rural Young Adults’ Perceptions of Cannabis
This study examines rural young adults’ attitudes toward recreational cannabis through the lens of the Moral Foundations Theory (MFT).
MFT
The MFT encompasses five universal foundations to explain the moral intuitions shaping individuals’ attitudes toward social issues (Haidt & Graham, 2007): Care, Fairness, Loyalty, Authority, and Purity.
Loyalty, authority, and purity are concerned with the well-being of the community, so they are combined into binding intuitions (Graham et al., 2011). We chose to examine binding moral foundations because they predict support for regulations on illicit drugs (Silver, 2020) and inhibit illegal cannabis use (Silver & Silver, 2021).
H1(a-c). Binding moral foundations are positively associated with descriptive norms.
Cannabis-Related Norms
Research shows that injunctive norms have a greater impact than descriptive norms on young adults’ cannabis use (Elgendi et al., 2022). We predicted that both descriptive norms (H2) and injunctive norms (H3) are positively associated with attitudes toward recreational cannabis.
Pro-Cannabis Content on Social Media
Young adults are exposed to numerous pro-cannabis content on social media (Park & Holody, 2018). Seeing ordinary people like oneself using cannabis makes individuals overestimate the cannabis use climate (Thrash & Warner, 2019). We predicted that exposure to pro-cannabis content on social media is positively associated with perceived descriptive norms (H4) and injunctive norms (H5) about cannabis.
Taking all the hypotheses together, we proposed the following model:
[Figure 1]
Methods
We launched our online questionnaire in July 2023. Young adults between the ages of 18 and 35 who lived in rural areas were eligible to participate in our study. The survey yielded 462 valid responses.
We adapted four questions from Yang & Zhao (2018) to measure exposure to pro-cannabis content on social media. Moral foundations were measured using the questions from Graham et al. (2011). The scales of descriptive and injunctive norms were adapted from Park & Smith (2007). We adopted five questions from Arora et al. (2020) and Edelstein et al. (2020) to measure attitudes toward recreational cannabis.
Results
A confirmatory factor analysis showed reasonable fit: χ2 (231) = 688.30, RMSEA = .0069 [.063, .075], CFI = .918. Loyalty (B = .223, SE = .076, p = .003), authority (B = .176, SE = .066, p = .007), purity (B = .261, SE = .074, p < .001), and social media exposure (B = .214, SE = .022, p < .001) were significantly associated with descriptive norms. Descriptive norms (B = .238, SE = .050, p < .001) were significantly related to attitudes toward recreational cannabis use. Although social media exposure was significantly related to injunctive norms (B = .360, SE = .023, p < .001), injunctive norms were not significantly related to attitudes toward recreational cannabis use (B = .051, SE = .049, p = .304).
[Figure 2]
Discussions and Conclusion
Binding moral foundations shape young adults’ descriptive norms, whereas exposure to pro-cannabis content on social media shapes both descriptive and injunctive norms. Somewhat surprisingly, rural young adults’ attitudes toward recreational cannabis are shaped by descriptive norms but not injunctive norms.
MFT
The MFT encompasses five universal foundations to explain the moral intuitions shaping individuals’ attitudes toward social issues (Haidt & Graham, 2007): Care, Fairness, Loyalty, Authority, and Purity.
Loyalty, authority, and purity are concerned with the well-being of the community, so they are combined into binding intuitions (Graham et al., 2011). We chose to examine binding moral foundations because they predict support for regulations on illicit drugs (Silver, 2020) and inhibit illegal cannabis use (Silver & Silver, 2021).
H1(a-c). Binding moral foundations are positively associated with descriptive norms.
Cannabis-Related Norms
Research shows that injunctive norms have a greater impact than descriptive norms on young adults’ cannabis use (Elgendi et al., 2022). We predicted that both descriptive norms (H2) and injunctive norms (H3) are positively associated with attitudes toward recreational cannabis.
Pro-Cannabis Content on Social Media
Young adults are exposed to numerous pro-cannabis content on social media (Park & Holody, 2018). Seeing ordinary people like oneself using cannabis makes individuals overestimate the cannabis use climate (Thrash & Warner, 2019). We predicted that exposure to pro-cannabis content on social media is positively associated with perceived descriptive norms (H4) and injunctive norms (H5) about cannabis.
Taking all the hypotheses together, we proposed the following model:
[Figure 1]
Methods
We launched our online questionnaire in July 2023. Young adults between the ages of 18 and 35 who lived in rural areas were eligible to participate in our study. The survey yielded 462 valid responses.
We adapted four questions from Yang & Zhao (2018) to measure exposure to pro-cannabis content on social media. Moral foundations were measured using the questions from Graham et al. (2011). The scales of descriptive and injunctive norms were adapted from Park & Smith (2007). We adopted five questions from Arora et al. (2020) and Edelstein et al. (2020) to measure attitudes toward recreational cannabis.
Results
A confirmatory factor analysis showed reasonable fit: χ2 (231) = 688.30, RMSEA = .0069 [.063, .075], CFI = .918. Loyalty (B = .223, SE = .076, p = .003), authority (B = .176, SE = .066, p = .007), purity (B = .261, SE = .074, p < .001), and social media exposure (B = .214, SE = .022, p < .001) were significantly associated with descriptive norms. Descriptive norms (B = .238, SE = .050, p < .001) were significantly related to attitudes toward recreational cannabis use. Although social media exposure was significantly related to injunctive norms (B = .360, SE = .023, p < .001), injunctive norms were not significantly related to attitudes toward recreational cannabis use (B = .051, SE = .049, p = .304).
[Figure 2]
Discussions and Conclusion
Binding moral foundations shape young adults’ descriptive norms, whereas exposure to pro-cannabis content on social media shapes both descriptive and injunctive norms. Somewhat surprisingly, rural young adults’ attitudes toward recreational cannabis are shaped by descriptive norms but not injunctive norms.