Involvement of tobacco in alcoholism and illicit drug use

Abstract

Survey data from the United States indicate that tobacco use is associated with the initiation of use of other addicting substances, and that increasing levels of tobacco use are associated with increasing levels of use of other psychoactive substances. Furthermore, factors affecting initiation, abstinence, and relapse to the use of tobacco, alcohol, and opioids are similar in nature. In addition, there are similarities in the addictive process underlying the use of these substances. Taken together, these data suggest that tobacco use is involved, possibly more than by simple association, in the use of other substances containing psychoactive chemicals. In the present paper we discuss the involvement of tobacco in the use of alcohol, opioids, cocaine, and other substances, as well as some of the implications of these observations for researchers and clinicians. One such implication is that it may be possible to use tobacco and nicotine as models for phenomena of interest to other substance use researchers. For example, drug abuse treatment and prevention strategies could be explored using tobacco use as a target behavior, and biological phenomena such as the development of tolerance and physical dependence may be more readily studied with nicotine than with many other drugs. Certain pharmacologic differences across substances are also discussed in light of their implications for development of treatment and drug control policies.

Family structure, parent-child conversation time and substance use among Chinese adolescents

“…Furthermore, by adjusting for parental smoking, we provided evidence that the association between family structure and adolescent smoking was not due to confounding by higher parental smoking rates among non-intact families. Although parental drinking and drug use were not recorded, their effects have probably been partially accounted for by the adjustment of parental smoking due to its correlation with drinking [42] and drug use [43]. The ORs for substance use were attenuated after adjusting for parent-child conversation time, suggesting that the associations were partially explained by parent-child communication.…”

Associations between a one-shot delay discounting measure and age, income, education and real-world impulsive behavior

“…As the differences in discounting between drug users and non-users are particularly strong, and drug use and smoking are highly correlated in our data and in other research findings (e.g., Henningfield, Clayton, & Pollin, 1990), we reran the binary logistic regression, leaving out smoking status. This time, drug and alcohol use were both significantly positively associated with choosing the smallersooner sum, Wald χ 2 (1) = 25.4, p < .001, odds ratio = 1.23 for drug use and Wald χ 2 (1) = 4.8, p = .002, odds ratio = 1.08 for alcohol use.…”

“…An alternative explanation would be that most studies examining drug use and delay discounting control for many important variables, but not for smoking status (e.g., Kirby et al, 1999;Madden, et al, 1997). Given the strong association between many types of drug use and smoking (Henningfield et al, 1990), and the fact that smokers discount more than non-smokers (e.g., Mitchell, 1999), it is possible that controlling for smoking status might reduce somewhat the differences in discounting between drug users and non-users.…”

Randomized Trial of Reduced-Nicotine Standards for Cigarettes

“…Other research concludes that cigarette smoking is a signifi cant predictor of both the probability and the frequency of other drug use (USDHHS 1988;Henningfield et al 1990). This research suggests that cigarettes and other substances are complements for one another and that higher cigarette prices, by discouraging smoking among youth, could significantly reduce youth and adult drinking and illicit drug use.…”

“…Symptoms observed less frequently (in less than 2 percent of patients) include irritability, lightheadedness, headache, excessive salivation, and anorexia (AMA 1993). Moreover, absorption of nico tine from the gum is highly dependent on the pH of the mouth (Henningfield et al 1990). Because nico tine is inactivated by an acidic environment, patients are urged to refrain from eating or drinking anything but water for 30 minutes before using the gum.…”