On Jan. 31, MAC Lab Co-Directors Stacey Hust and Jessica Willoughby presented at the 6th Annual Cannabis Action Conference. Dr. Hust and Dr. Willoughby presented on the results of a state-wide survey of teens and young adults about cannabis product packaging and implications for prevention. The session was titled Examining cannabis edibles packaging: Findings from a survey of Washington State youth.
In January 2023, members of the MAC Lab published an article in Health Communication about associations between viewing pro and anti-cannabis social media messages and teens’ and college students’ intentions to use cannabis. A WSU Insider piece by Sara Zaske described the research and was quickly picked up by other media outlets. The research has been covered in 47 news outlets. The results of that interest? The article has been viewed more than 4000 times!
The Washington State University Graduate School has named Leticia Couto, a research assistant in the MAC Lab, as the recipient of the Richard R. and Constance M. Albrecht Scholarship. The award is open to all active doctoral graduate students who have passed their preliminary examinations and is awarded to students based on excellence in scholarly and research activities. Such activities can include peer-reviewed publications, grant efforts, and service to the institution, profession and community. Congratulations, Leti!
Opeyemi Johnson, a research assistant with the MAC Lab, recently successfully defended her thesis proposal. Opeyemi will be conducting a content analysis to examine the consent messages present in children’s books. We look forward to hearing more about Opeyemi’s work.
A new article in 
Drug and Alcohol Review describes a MAC Lab experiment on the inclusion of sexualized appeals in cannabis advertising. The research team conducted an online experiment with college students in Washington state, showing participants brand-generated cannabis social media ads that included either images that contained sexual objectification of women or recreational appeals. Exposure to sexualized ads was associated with increased perceptions of cannabis sex enhancement scripts and increased cannabis sex enhancement expectancies. Full text is available in the journal.
Two team members from the MAC Lab presented on in progress research findings at the WSU 2023 Academic Showcase. Academic Showcase is a forum for sharing research with the WSU community.
Christina Nickerson presented “A qualitative exploration of the relationship between cannabis and sex among young adults.” The poster described initial findings from a thematic analysis of in-depth interviews with 10 participants who had used cannabis prior to sex. Participants described their social media use and perceptions of cannabis messaging, as well as their own experiences.
Ron Price presented “A qualitative exploration of youth’s perceptions of cannabis-infused product packaging appeals in Washington state.” Results described findings from virtual focus groups conducted with 28 13-17 year olds in Washington state where the team explored teens’ perceptions of cannabis product packaging appeals.
Chelsea Thomas, M.S., a scholarly assistant professor in the Murrow College of Communication, will be presenting on the development of one-page documents created as part of an effort to disseminate MAC lab research findings.
Chelsea created two one-pagers designed to showcase research findings and implications for two separate audiences, parents and public health practitioners and policymakers. She summarized findings from research and a report on cannabis product packaging perceptions data gathered among Washington state teens. Learn more about the research on our projects page. Chelsea gathered feedback on the one-pagers to learn more about what people took away from the summary of findings. She will be presenting a poster on the development of the dissemination effort and the findings from the evaluation at the 33rd Annual Art and Science of Health Promotion Conference.
Looking for a scale to measure sex-related cannabis expectancies? We just recently published a brief report in The Journal of Sex Research that described the testing of the sex-related cannabis expectancies scale across age and gender.