An Empirical Analysis of Indoor Tanners: Implications for Audience Segmentation in Campaigns

Tanning bed use before age 35 has been strongly associated with several types of skin cancer. The current study sought to advance an understanding of audience segmentation for indoor tanning among young women. Panhellenic sorority systems at two universities in the Southeastern United States participated in this study. A total of 1,481 young women took the survey; 421 (28%) had tanned indoors in the previous 12 months and were the focus of the analyses reported in this article. Results suggested two distinct tanner types: regular (n = 60) and irregular (n = 353) tanners. Regular tanners tanned more frequently (M = 36.2 vs. 8.6 times per year) and reported significantly higher positive outcome expectations (p <.001) and lower negative outcome expectations (p <.01) than irregular tanners, among other significant differences. Hierarchical logistic regression analysis revealed several significant (p <.001) predictors of regular tanning type, with tanning dependence emerging as the strongest predictor of this classification (OR = 2.25). Implications for developing anti-tanning messages directed at regular and irregular tanners are discussed.