NICOTINE DEPRIVATION AND IMPLICIT MOTIVATIONAL PROCESSES OF DRINKING AND SMOKING

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR:  COHN, AMY M  

GRANT NUMBER:  R03 CA175870-01A1S1

ABSTRACT:  Research has lagged considerably at identifying motivational factors of use in populations of smokers who also drink at risky levels, even though the co-occurrence of alcohol use disorders (AUDs) and nicotine dependence is high. This administrative supplement, “Nicotine deprivation and implicit motivational processes of drinking and smoking ” is designed to address two main research questions not currently answered in the extant literature about why smoking and drinking are so highly correlated with each other and why alcohol use may be particularly detrimental to smoking cessation efforts. Specifically, we seek to examine whether (a) regular smokers with a pattern of risky drinking will have enhanced implicit motivations to use alcohol relative to cigarettes and (b) motivations to drink versus smoke differ under times of acute nicotine deprivation. We will explore these questions using an experimental implicit association task paradigm in a sample of 60 risky and 60 non-risky drinking smokers under conditions of nicotine deprivation and non-deprivation. The task will measure the speed in which participants pair alcohol or smoking pictures with approach or avoid words. Faster pairings of alcohol pictures with approach words, versus smoking pictures with approach words, indicate greater motivations to drink; while faster pairings of smoking pictures with approach words (over alcohol and approach) indicate greater motivations to smoke. Understanding the factors that link heavy drinking and smoking will provide valuable information at helping smokers quit and stay quit, given the low rates of success of most smoking cessation interventions. Further, interventions that target smokers who are also problem drinkers may have broad public health impact by reducing not only rates of smoking, but of heavy drinking, and perhaps AUDs. Findings from this administrative supplement, which will complement those of the parent grant (1R03CA175870-01A1 “Real time patterns of smoking and alcohol use: A daily data analysis”) are urgently needed to provide a conceptual framework that will guide the development of improved bio-psychosocial treatments for risky drinking smokers who are known to have elevated cancer risk, less success quitting smoking, and greater nicotine dependence. Project

 

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