Rutgers' Cancer Institute of New Jersey, School of Public Health conducts study linking teenage indoor tanning with smoking, social media use

Once a person picks up a habit, whether it be indoor tanning, smoking or using social media on a regular basis, it can be hard to stop.

For individuals hooked on these habits, researchers from the Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey and Rutgers School of Public Health conducted a study that correlated indoor tanning among teens in New Jersey with smoking and social media usage.

Research shows more than a third of New Jersey high school students found indoor tanners were more likely to smoke and engage in social media activities related to indoor tanning, such as liking the salon's page on Facebook or following them on Twitter.

The study pulled data from the 2012 New Jersey Youth Tobacco Survey, which 1,850 public school students between grades nine through 12 completed.

Questions in the study included whether a student smoked more than one cigarette in the past 30 days and whether students used social media to connect to tanning salons to some degree.

Eight and a half percent of the 1,754 students who answered the question about indoor tanning reported partaking in the activity in the last year, according to the study. Of the students who reported indoor tanning, 38 percent were frequent tanners, having tanned ten or more times in the last year.

The study also showed that frequent indoor tanning was more common among indoor tanners who were current smokers, which included 57.6 percent of frequent tanners. More than 90 percent of frequent tanners said it would be very hard to stop the activity.

Lead author Elliot Coups, a behavioral scientist at the Cancer Institute of New Jersey and an associate professor of medicine at the Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, said although a commercial tanning bed ban is in place for those under 17 years of age, researchers learned from the experience of other states that this does not entirely eliminate indoor tanning among youth.

Coups worked on the study with Jerod Stapleton at the cancer institute and Robert Wood Johnson, Christine Davis at the School of Public Health and Cristine Delnevo at the Cancer Institute and School of Public Health.

Coups said there is a need to develop and implement interventions for this population, as well as for youth across the United States, to reduce the likelihood that they will engage in indoor tanning.

“An approach we would like to try is targeting people who are liking or favoriting things that have to do with indoor tanning, and countering them, like showing the risks of indoor tanning,” Coups said. “We want to reach out to them and show them, ‘Hey, maybe this thing you’re doing isn’t such a great idea.’”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, indoor tanning is dangerous for those who begin in adolescence or early adulthood, as it puts them at a higher risk of developing melanoma, which is the deadliest skin cancer.

“Given more than half of frequent tanners are using social media related to indoor tanning, this might serve as a viable mechanism to deliver messaging about the risks of this activity,” Coups said.

Coups also said the higher rate of smoking among frequent tanners suggested “these users may benefit from interventions that address multiple behavioral risk factors.”

But for some, interventions might not be enough.

Anna Gatchenko, a School of Arts and Sciences first-year student, said she is a frequent tanner and smoker, going through about three cigarettes a day and tanning every other day.

“I love looking tan,” she said. “It makes me look prettier.”

She said if she was faced with an intervention, like Coups suggested, she would probably not stop either of the activities unless it affected her directly in the form of a serious diagnosis.

“I mean, when I smoke or tan I know there’s a risk to get cancer, and obviously it’s not good for you, but I’m willing to take the risk,” Gatchenko said. “I know what I am doing, I know what it might cause, and I don’t think other people telling me would affect it unless I want to do it myself.”

She is attempting to quit cigarettes and has cut down from 10 cigarettes a day to three to four per day.

Other college students, such as Natalie da Silva, a School of Arts and Sciences students first-year student, and Susan Kim, a School of Arts and Sciences sophomore, know the lure of indoor tanning, but do not use social media to further their attachment to a salon.

Da Silva said she used to go tanning about four days a week for four years at "Jamaican Me Tan" in Woodbridge but recently quit the habit.

“I quit because I knew it wasn’t healthy. It also adds up financially, and I learned to accept the way I look,” da Silva said.

Kim said she went tanning about once a week because she said she disliked how pale she looked in the winter. Her gym, Planet Fitness, offers tanning booths as part of their membership.

But Kim said she does not follow them on social media, saying she “doesn’t care enough to follow them” since she does not follow product or brand accounts.

The tanning salon da Silva frequented did not have any type of social media accounts at the time, but she said she would not have felt very inclined to follow them regardless.

She also said she still misses tanning to this day, but did not find it difficult to stop, due to her finances.

“It got harder to go as frequently since I started dorming and also (because of) the money,” da Silva said.