The effects of smoking and smoking abstinence on verbal and visuospatial working memory capacity.

Full Abstract

Several studies have examined the effects of smoking and abstaining from smoking on working memory (WM) but have yielded inconclusive findings. Thus, the authors used a repeated measures design to assess the effects of smoking and abstaining from smoking on both visuospatial and verbal WM capacity (WMC) using highly reliable, well-validated, and theoretically driven WM span tasks. Verbal n-back was also administered to examine its relationship to these complex WM span tasks and to compare this study's results with previous findings. Smokers (n=23) and nonsmokers (n=21) participated in 2 sessions separated by 1 week. During 1 session, smokers completed the WM tasks after abstaining from smoking for at least 12 hr, whereas in the other session smokers did not abstain from smoking and were tested immediately after smoking (all WM tasks were completed 45 min or less since last cigarette). Results indicated that smokers' verbal WM span was lower than nonsmokers' and was lower during the nonabstinent session compared with the abstinent session. Smokers' verbal n-back performance was also lower than nonsmokers', although there was no difference in verbal n-back performance between the smoking sessions. In contrast, there was no difference in visuospatial WM span between the smoking sessions or between smokers and nonsmokers. Taken together, these findings demonstrate that (a) smokers' verbal WM is lower than nonsmokers, (b) smokers' verbal WMC is lower during nonabstinence compared with abstinence, and (c) smoking exhibits differential effects on the different WM domains. Copyright (c) 2009 APA, all rights reserved.

Author information

Author/s: Greenstein, Justin E (JE); Kassel, Jon D (JD);

Affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60607, USA.

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

Journal: Experimental and clinical psychopharmacology (Exp Clin Psychopharmacol), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2009-Apr; vol 17 (issue 2) : pp 78-90

Dates: Created 2009/03/31; Completed 2009/05/19;

PMID: 19331484, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 5/19/2009, IMS Date: 19 May 2009 00:00:00)

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