Smoking higher-nicotine cigarettes during a stressful movie, compared to low-nicotine cigarettes, reduced anxiety and right hemisphere activation, and increased heart rate.
Does smoking higher-nicotine cigarettes alter anxiety, heart rate, and EEG lateralization during a stressful movie compared to low-nicotine cigarettes or sham-smoking?
Higher nicotine delivery from cigarettes may reduce anxiety during stress, an effect potentially mediated by right hemisphere EEG activation.
The effects of smoking cigarettes with differing FTC nicotine deliveries on anxiety and EEG activity were evaluated in 40 smokers who were compared with 40 non-smokers, matched for age and gender. Following smoking (sham-smoking in the case of the non-smokers), the participants viewed a stress-inducing movie. Smoking higher-nicotine delivery cigarettes during the movie, as compared to smoking low-nicotine control cigarettes, was associated with reductions in anxiety and right hemisphere activation, increased heart rate, and enhancement of the ratio of left-hemisphere parietal EEG activation to right-hemisphere activation. These results are interpreted as indicating that the anxiolytic effects of nicotine may be mediated by the right hemisphere. The EEG activity and emotional responses of non-smokers were more like those of smokers who smoked the lower-nicotine cigarettes than those of smokers of the higher-nicotine cigarettes.
Gilbert et al. (Mon,) reported a other. Higher-nicotine delivery cigarettes vs. Low-nicotine control cigarettes and sham-smoking non-smokers was evaluated on Anxiety, heart rate, and lateralization of EEG. Smoking higher-nicotine cigarettes during a stressful movie, compared to low-nicotine cigarettes, reduced anxiety and right hemisphere activation, and increased heart rate.
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