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Cigarette smoking during childhood and adolescence “causes significant health problems among young people, including an increase in the number and severity of respiratory illnesses, decreased physical fitness, and potential effects on lung growth and function,” warns the American Lung Association. “Most importantly, this is when an addiction to smoking takes hold, often lasting into and sometimes throughout adulthood. Among adults who have ever smoked daily, 87 percent had tried their first cigarette by the time they were 18 years of age, and 95 percent had by age 21.”
A new study from the Penn State Department of Biobehavioral Health suggests that young adults may actually be more vulnerable to nicotine addiction than middle-aged people. The results provide evidence that the effects of drugs on the body—both medication and misused substances—change over the lifespan in ways that clinicians and researchers need to consider when developing and prescribing treatments, the researchers said.
The researchers demonstrated that nicotine lowers the body temperature of young-adult mice more quickly and reduces their movement more significantly than it does in middle-aged mice. According to the researchers, the results indicate how nicotine’s effects change as people age.
Doctoral student Carlos Novoa and his adviser, Thomas Gould, Jean Phillips Shibley Professor of Biobehavioral Health and head of the department, led the study. According to a PSU press release, “Gould’s prior research has illustrated the differential effects of nicotine in children, adolescents, and young adults. The current study demonstrated that those effects differ even among those considered adults: young adult mice—aged two months—respond more acutely to a nicotine dose of the same strength relative to their body size than middle-aged mice—aged eight months.”
Adolescence is a time of growing independence, exploration, and risk-taking. “Teens may experiment with nicotine via cigarettes or vaping, alcohol, and marijuana, at a time when exposure to these substances can have a significant impact on brain development,” warns the National Institute on Drug Abuse. “Early use of alcohol and other substances can increase the likelihood of going on to use other drugs and of developing a substance use disorder.”
“Sometimes, people think of development as something that occurs until we reach a certain age—like 18 or 25—and then stops,” Professor Gould said. “But people continue to develop and change across their entire lifespan, and this affects how our bodies respond to medications and other chemicals, including nicotine. This research adds one piece to the puzzle of all the factors — age, biological sex, genetics and many others—needed to create effective medical treatments and policies for all people.”
In this study, both young adult and middle-aged study subjects displayed decreased movement after receiving nicotine, but young adults reduced their movements more than middle-aged subjects. This indicates that the young adult subjects experienced the effects of nicotine more intensely, according to the researchers.
“Since we know that young adults are more likely to smoke or vape for the hedonic sensation—as opposed to older nicotine users who are more likely to use because they are addicted or to manage stress—this larger response matters,” said Novoa, the first author of the study. “The younger you are, the more acute your response to nicotine. This has implications both for prevention messages and for supporting young nicotine users who want to quit.”
The PSU study and others like it may help design interventions that make quitting more successful. Currently, fewer than 10 percent of attempts to quit smoking succeed, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“The results demonstrate that young adults are more susceptible to the impact of nicotine,” Novoa said. “This puts them at greater risk for developing addiction to the drug, which has implications for both prevention programs and treatments. The legal age to buy tobacco products is 21, but the risk for a 21-year-old individual is higher than it is for a 45-year-old. We need to understand how nicotine affects people based on their individual characteristics so that we can better prevent smoking and help people quit.”
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