Effects of Nicotine Use on Cognitive Performance

Abstract

Research on the relationship between nicotine and cognitive function have largely been studied to develop therapeutic treatments for dementia, Alzheimer's, and schizophrenia (Powledge, 2004). Previous literature supports that there are cognitive benefits from nicotine use (Dawkins et al., 2013; Domier et al., 2007; Ernst et al., 2001; Mendrek et al., 2006; Schlienz et al., 2013). The amount of research on nicotinic effects on object memory and spatial ability is scarce so the present study would benefit existing literature. Thus, to elucidate the effects of nicotine, the present study examined the effects of regular nicotine use on object memory and spatial ability. We hypothesized that regular nicotine users would perform better on spatial and object memory tasks than individuals who don't use nicotine. The Mental Rotations Test and the Object Array Task were used to study spatial abilities and object memory. We recruited 29 young adult volunteer participants from Purchase College (State University of New York) with a range of ages from 18-25 years old. Regular nicotine users performed better than did non-nicotine users on all object array conditions while regular nicotine users and non-nicotine users had similar scores on the mental rotations test. The results of the object array task highlight nicotine's ability to enhance cognition, memory in particular. The beneficial effects of nicotine on the object memory task may be mediated by the perirhinal cortex. Results of the mental rotations test are not consistent with previous research supporting that nicotine is a cognitive enhancer and suggest regular nicotine use may not affect spatial tasks, which may be mediated by the hippocampus. Keywords: nicotine, cognitive performance, object memory, spatial ability