Understanding delay discounting in cigarette smokers

描述（由申请人提供）：在美国，吸烟是可预防死亡的主要原因，大量的努力已经记录和宣传了相关的危害。尽管人们对吸烟的内在危害有着广泛的了解，但仍有超过20%的人口吸烟。这一建议旨在了解可能构成这种对个人健康的严重明显忽视的基本机制之一：延迟折扣。延迟折扣是指后果在不立即发生时失去价值的方式。在遥远的未来会发生的事情比马上会发生的事情对我们的激励力要小。如果一个人只对相对短期的结果敏感，这被认为是一种冲动。研究发现，吸烟者比不吸烟者更容易低估未来的货币结果。最近的研究表明，一个人对未来金钱结果的折扣程度可以预测他们是否会成为吸烟者，以及一旦成为吸烟者，他们戒烟的难度有多大。因此，延迟折扣是与吸烟相关的重要个体脆弱性特征。本建议的目的是提供一个基本的理解急剧折扣的未来后果在吸烟者。例如，尽管吸烟者和非吸烟者的金钱折扣研究结果很清楚，但我们还不知道吸烟者的急剧折扣的程度和普遍性。这可能是因为他们比不吸烟的人更容易对各种结果进行折扣，或者他们的大幅折扣可能仅限于香烟和用于购买香烟的金钱。我们也不了解尼古丁戒断在产生对延迟后果不敏感性方面的作用和机制。虽然一些有限的信息表明，吸烟者在戒断过程中可能会变得更加冲动，但我们不知道这在多大程度上是一种普遍现象，也不知道它是否与戒断的特定方面有关，如短期记忆和负面影响的中断。最后，吸烟者对香烟特别冲动，原因尚不清楚。我们建议研究香烟的一些基本特征，这些特征不同于货币（直接消费，单一的替代品），看看它们是否会因延迟而产生急剧的折扣。这项建议的目标是重要的，在了解适应不良的短视行为的吸烟者，并可以进一步发展更有效的预防和戒烟策略。 公共卫生相关性：这个项目与公共卫生有关，因为它将进一步了解为什么吸烟者似乎对他们行为的延迟负面后果如此不敏感。因此，我们可以帮助制定新的策略，以防止人们开始吸烟，以及帮助他们成功戒烟，如果他们已经吸烟。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable death in the United States, and substantial efforts have documented and publicized the associated hazards. Despite widespread knowledge of the inherent dangers, though, over 20% of the population still smokes. This proposal is designed to understand one of the basic mechanisms that may underlie such profound apparent disregard for one's health: delay discounting. Delay discounting refers to the way that consequences lose value when they are not immediate. Things that will happen to us in the distant future have less power to motivate us than things that will happen right away. If a person is sensitive to only relatively short-term outcomes, it is considered a form of impulsivity. Cigarette smokers have been found to discount future monetary outcomes more so than non-smokers. Recent research indicates that the degree to which a person discounts future monetary outcomes is predictive of whether they will become a smoker, and how much difficulty they will have quitting once they are a smoker. Thus, delay discounting is an important individual vulnerability characteristic related to smoking. The purpose of this proposal is to provide a basic understanding of steep discounting of future consequences in cigarette smokers. For example, despite the clarity of findings on discounting of money by smokers and non-smokers, we do not yet know the extent and generality of steep discounting in cigarette smokers. It could be that they discount a variety of outcomes more so than non-smokers, or their steep discounting could be limited to cigarettes and money, which is used to purchase cigarettes. We also do not understand the role and mechanisms of nicotine withdrawal in generating insensitivity to delayed consequences. While some limited information suggests smokers may become more impulsive during withdrawal, we do not know the extent to which this is a general phenomenon and whether it is related to particular aspects of withdrawal, like disruptions in short-term memory and negative affect. Finally, cigarette smokers are particularly impulsive with respect to cigarettes, for reasons that are not understood. We propose to investigate some of the basic features of cigarettes that differ from money (direct consumption, single alternative available) to see if they produce steep discounting by delay. The goals of this proposal are important in the understanding the maladaptive shortsighted actions of cigarette smokers, and could further the development of more effective prevention and cessation strategies. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: This project is relevant to public health because it will further our understanding of why cigarette smokers seem so insensitive to the delayed negative consequences of their behavior. As a result, we may help to develop new strategies to prevent people from starting to smoke, as well as to help them quit successfully if they already smoke.