Influence of Stress and the Appetitive Nature of Drug Cues, Skin Conductance, and Heart Rate in a Nicotine Dependent Sample.

Abstract

The affective modulation of the startle response has been utilized to examine the motivational valence of nicotine cues. A recent study reconfirming that nicotine cues are appetitive in nature promotes this paradigm as a potentially valuable tool for elucidating mechanisms involved in nicotine addiction. The current study examined the influence of stress, a negative affective state intimately linked with nicotine use, on the affective modulation of the startle response to smoking cues. Twenty-nine nicotine dependent participants were randomly assigned to a stress or control condition directly before administration of the affective modulation of the startle response paradigm. Both groups evinced significantly diminished startle magnitudes in response to nicotine cues as compared to threat images. A pattern indicating a greater decrease in startle magnitude means while viewing nicotine images for individuals in the stress condition was observed, however the cue by group interaction was not significant. Analyses also include event related heart rate analysis, and tonic and phasic skin conductance analysis.