Park Annie D, Farrahi Layla N, Pang Raina D, Guillot Casey R, Aguirre Claudia G, Leventhal Adam M
Department of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California.
Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California.
J Stud Alcohol Drugs. 2016 Sep;77(5):766-73. doi: 10.15288/jsad.2016.77.766.
Negative urgency-the tendency to act rashly during negative affective states-is a risk factor for regular cigarette smoking. This human laboratory study tested a novel theoretical model of the underlying mechanisms linking negative urgency and smoking motivation, which purports that smokers with high negative urgency are at increased susceptibility to abstinence-induced increases in negative affect, which, in turn, provokes the urge to smoke to suppress negative affect.
Smokers (N = 180, >10 cigarettes/day) attended a baseline session at which they completed self-report measures of negative urgency and other co-factors and subsequently attended two counterbalanced within-subject experimental sessions (i.e., 16 hours of smoking abstinence or smoking as usual). At both experimental sessions, self-reported tobacco withdrawal symptoms, affect, and smoking urge were assessed.
Negative urgency was associated with larger abstinence-induced increases in tobacco withdrawal symptoms, negative affect, and urge to smoke to alleviate negative affect, both with and without controlling for anxiety, depression, tobacco dependence, and sensation seeking (βs > .18, ps < .05). The association between negative urgency and abstinence-induced increases in urge to smoke to alleviate negative affect was mediated by greater abstinence-induced increases in negative affect (βs > .062, ps = .01).
These results provide initial support of this model by providing evidence that smokers with higher (vs. lower) negative urgency may be more prone to greater negative affect during withdrawal, which in turn may promote urge to smoke to suppress negative emotion. Research extending this model to other settings, measures, and methodological approaches may be fruitful.
消极紧迫性——在消极情绪状态下冲动行事的倾向——是经常吸烟的一个风险因素。这项人体实验室研究测试了一个关于消极紧迫性与吸烟动机之间潜在机制的新理论模型，该模型认为消极紧迫性高的吸烟者更容易受到戒断引起的消极情绪增加的影响，进而引发吸烟冲动以抑制消极情绪。
吸烟者（N = 180，每天吸烟超过10支）参加一次基线测试，期间他们完成了消极紧迫性及其他相关因素的自我报告测量，随后参加了两个平衡的受试者内实验环节（即16小时戒烟或照常吸烟）。在两个实验环节中，均对自我报告的烟草戒断症状、情绪和吸烟冲动进行了评估。
无论是否控制焦虑、抑郁、烟草依赖和寻求刺激等因素，消极紧迫性都与戒断引起的烟草戒断症状、消极情绪增加以及为缓解消极情绪而产生的吸烟冲动增大有关（β值>.18，p值<.05）。消极紧迫性与戒断引起的为缓解消极情绪而产生的吸烟冲动增加之间的关联，是由戒断引起的消极情绪更大幅度增加所介导的（β值>.062，p值=.01）。
这些结果为该模型提供了初步支持，证据表明消极紧迫性较高（相对于较低）的吸烟者在戒断期间可能更容易产生更大的消极情绪，进而可能促使吸烟冲动以抑制负面情绪。将该模型扩展到其他环境、测量方法和研究方法的研究可能会取得丰硕成果。
