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SR141716 blocked acute psychological and physiological effects of smoked marijuana without altering THC pharmacokinetics. These findings confirm, for the first time in humans, the central role of CB1 receptors in mediating the effects of marijuana.

More comprehensive models are needed to understand the relationships among disparities, social context, diversity, inequalities and inequities. A systematic approach will also help researchers, practitioners, advocates and policy makers determine critical points for interventions, the types of studies and programs needed and integrative approaches needed to eliminate tobacco-related disparities.

The discovery of the role of nicotinic receptors in attention and memory has led to the testing of nicotinic analogs as cognitive enhancing agents in patient populations. Empirical information about nicotine's ability to enhance elements of attention and memory in normal individuals might guide development of therapeutic uses of nicotine in cognitively impaired populations. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of nicotine on continuous attention, working memory, and computational processing in tobacco-deprived and nondeprived smokers. A total of 28 smokers (14 men, 14 women) participated in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, within-subject study, in which they were overnight (12 h) tobacco deprived at one session and smoked ad libitum before the other session. At each session, participants received 0, 1, and 2 mg nicotine via nasal spray in random order at 90 min intervals. Before and after each dose, a battery of cognitive, subjective, and physiological measures was administered, and blood samples were taken for plasma nicotine concentration. Overnight tobacco deprivation resulted in impaired functioning on all cognitive tests and increased self-reports of tobacco craving and negative mood; nicotine normalized these deficits. In the nondeprived condition, nicotine enhanced performance on the continuous performance test (CPT) and an arithmetic test in a dose-related manner, but had no effect on working memory. In general, women were more sensitive than men to the subjective effects of nicotine. These results provide an unequivocal determination that nicotine enhanced attentional and computational abilities in nondeprived smokers and suggest these cognitive domains as substrates for novel therapeutic indications.

Gender differences in tobacco withdrawal are of considerable clinical importance, but research findings on this topic have been mixed. Methodological variation in samples sizes, experimental design, and measures across studies may explain the inconsistent results. The current study examined whether male (n = 101) and female (n = 102) smokers (≥15 cigarettes/day) differed in abstinenceinduced changes on a battery of self-report measures (withdrawal, affect, craving), cognitive performance tasks (attention, psychomotor performance), and physiological responses (heart rate, blood pressure, brain electroencephalogram). Participants attended 2 counterbalanced laboratory sessions, 1 following 12 hr of abstinence and the other following ad libitum smoking. Results showed that women reported greater abstinence-induced increases in negative affect, withdrawal-related distress, and urge to smoke to relieve withdrawal distress. In contrast, both genders reported similar abstinence-induced changes in positive affect and urge to smoke for pleasure. Men and women exhibited generally similar abstinence-induced changes in physiological and cognitive performance measures. In addition, gender did not moderate the association between withdrawal symptoms and baseline measures of smoking behavior and dependence. Abstinence-induced changes in withdrawal distress mediated the effect of gender on latency until the 1st cigarette of the day at trend levels (p < .10). These findings suggest that there are qualitative gender differences in the acute tobacco withdrawal syndrome that may underlie gender-specific smoking patterns. NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author ManuscriptResearch suggests that women are less likely than men to successfully quit smoking. Recent meta-analyses of smoking cessation trials showed lower abstinence rates for women than men, regardless of whether individuals received group or individual counseling (Wetter, Kenford, et al., 1999), nicotine replacement therapy (Cepeda-Benito, Reynoso, & Erath, 2004;Wetter, Kenford, et al., 1999) or placebo nicotine patch (Wetter, Kenford, et al., 1999), or bupropion sustained release or placebo (Collins et al., 2004;Scharf & Shiffman, 2004). Although there is debate over whether women's quit rates are lower than men's at the population level (Gritz, Nielsen, & Brooks, 1996) or whether differences are large enough to be clinically significant (Killen, Fortmann, Varady, & Kraemer, 2002), it is important to identify gender-specific processes underlying tobacco addiction so that interventions can be tailored to gender.In recent years, researchers have investigated several variables that might differentially impact smoking behavior in men and women. These include attitudes toward cessation (Etter, Prokhorov, & Perneger, 2002), concerns about weight gain (Borrelli, Spring, Niaura, Hitsman, & Papandonatos, 2001), depressive and anxious symptomatology (Borrelli, Bock, King, & Pinto, 1996), nicotine reinforcement (Perkins, Donny, & Caggiula, 1999), mens...