Factors predicting smoking in a laboratory-based smoking-choice task

This study aimed to expand the current understanding of smoking maintenance mechanisms by examining how putative risk factors of relapse relate to a single behavioral smoking choice using a novel laboratory smoking-choice task. After 12 hours of nicotine deprivation, participants were exposed to smoking cues and given the choice between smoking up to two cigarettes in a 15-minute window or waiting and receiving four cigarettes after a delay of 45 minutes. This single behavioral choice was meant to model real-world choices to forgo the immediate gratification of smoking to achieve delayed benefits associated with abstinence. Greater nicotine dependence, higher impulsivity, and lower distress tolerance were hypothesized to predict earlier and more intensive smoking. Out of 35 participants, 26 chose to smoke with a median time to a first puff of 1.22 minutes (standard deviation=2.62 min, range=0.03-10.62 min). Survival analyses examined latency to first puff, and results indicated that greater pre-task craving and smoking more cigarettes per day were significantly related to smoking sooner in the task. Greater behavioral disinhibition was a significant risk factor predicting shorter smoking latency in the first two minutes of the task, but not at a delay of more than two minutes. Lower distress tolerance (reporting greater regulation efforts to alleviate distress) was related to more puffs smoked during the task. This novel laboratory smoking-choice paradigm may be a useful laboratory analog for the choices smokers make during cessation attempts and may help identify factors that influence smoking lapses.