Reduced Influence of Monetary Incentives on Go/NoGo Performance During Smoking Abstinence: Table 1.

Abstract

Introduction: Smokers may experience decreased sensitivity to nondrug incentives during acute smoking deprivation. This decreased sensitivity may undermine attempts to encourage continued abstinence by enhancing cognitive processes through the use of monetary incentives. This study assessed whether the capacity for monetary incentives to enhance cognitive performance was compromised in nicotine-deprived smokers. Method: Eighteen smokers performed an incentivized Go/NoGo task on 2 occasions, once after smoking as usual prior to the session, and once after undergoing 12-hr abstinence. Participants could earn up to $5.00 ($2.50 per session) based on their performance on reward blocks of the Go/ NoGo task. Results: Performance was significantly more accurate on incentivized NoGo, frequent-Go, and infrequent-Go trials relative to neutral trials during the smoke as usual session. Participants also produced fewer premature, impulsive responses on rewarded versus neutral blocks during the smoke as usual session. No significant difference between reward and neutral blocks was observed on any of the 4 performance indices during the abstinent session. Conclusions: The ability for monetary incentives to enhance inhibitory control may be compromised during acute abstinence in smokers. These findings may have implications for contingency management treatment programs which are thought to promote continued abstinence partly by facilitating the allocation of cognitive resources to processes that encourage continued abstinence by increasing the value associated with continued abstinence.

Electroencephalography reveals a selective disruption of cognitive control processes in craving cigarette smokers

“…It could also be the case that after only a short deprivation, inhibitory deficits are not found, as they have been shown to emerge only after longer (e.g. 10–72 hr) periods of abstinence in other studies examining inhibition in smokers (Charles‐Walsh, Furlong, Munro, & Hester, ; Harrison, Coppola, & McKee, ; Lydon et al, ; Tsaur, Strasser, Souprountchouk, Evans, & Ashare, ).…”

“…smokers (Charles-Walsh, Furlong, Munro, & Hester, 2014;Harrison, Coppola, & McKee, 2009;Lydon et al, 2015;Tsaur, Strasser, Souprountchouk, Evans, & Ashare, 2015).…”

“…We included this to keep subjects engaged in the task, but we also sought to examine how craving influenced the response to feedback. Smokers who have been deprived of nicotine for 12 hr have been found to show decreased sensitivity to monetary rewards (Lydon, Roberts, & Geier, ) and have decreased signatures of performance monitoring (Schlienz, Hawk, & Rosch, ). We therefore hypothesized that it could be the case that the smokers in our study would be overall less sensitive to the feedback when they were craving, but also that they may differentiate more between low and high feedback, as high feedback would bring them closer to their reward of smoking.…”

A Novel Hierarchical LATER Process Model: Evaluating Latent Sources of Variation in Reaction Times of Adult Daily Smokers

“…Utilizing a threshold is well documented in the reaction time literature [see, e.g., Ref. (40)] (46). The trial types were presented pseudo-randomly.…”

“…The current dataset has previously been explored via the traditional frequentist approach to examine the effects of reward and smoking conditions on the latency and accuracy of task performance (see Ref. 40). However, it is not well understood which cognitive parameters nicotine affects.…”