The impact of nicotine on cognitive functions

Within the field of smoking research, there is debate on the impact of nicotine on cognitive functions such as memory and attention. The most intricate part of the cognitive system is the 'executive functions' which generally co-ordinate a host of other functions and standard behaviour. The executive functions are the last to develop in adolescence and the first to start deteriorating in healthy ageing; they are also implicated in a range of other disorders such as Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Since 2004, we have been developing and refining a new test of executive functions using the School's virtual reality expertise (aka Tony Leadbetter). This new test known as JEF (the Jansari assessment of Executive Functions), looks like a computer game with the participant moving around an office environment completing tasks that an office temp might be asked to perform. These tasks have been designed to tap various aspects of the executive system and provide a profile of abilities that currently available clinical tests are unable to provide. In a collaborative study with an MSc student Dan Froggatt and two experts in smoking research, our own Lynne Dawkins and Trudi Edginton from Westminster University, we used JEF to look at smokers and nonsmokers who were either given a nicotine gum or a placebo gum to see the impact on their executive functions. The results demonstrated quite categorically, that without the nicotine, smokers perform relatively poorly and that with the nicotine gum, there is an improvement in performance which is generally to the level of non-smokers on a placebo gum. The effects were particularly marked for 'prospective memory' which is the ability to remember to do things in the future (e.g. turning the oven on in ten minutes time). This new paper will hopefully make a useful addition to our understanding of the impact of nicotine on cognitive functions. Further, the paper nicely adds to three other papers published by a collaborator, Cathy Montgomery at Liverpool John Moores University who has used JEF to look at the impact of ecstasy, alcohol and cannabis in three separate studies.

Ashok Jansari