Neural Substrates of Resisting Craving During Cigarette Cue Exposure (original) (raw)
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Neural correlates of craving and resisting craving for tobacco in nicotine dependent smokers
Addiction Biology, 2011
Craving is a significant factor which can lead to relapse during smoking quit attempts. Attempts to resist urges to smoke during cue-elicited craving have been shown to activate regions in the brain associated with decision-making, anxiety regulation, and visual processing. In this study, 32 treatment-seeking, nicotine-dependent smokers viewed blocks of smoking and neutral cues alternating with rest periods during MRI scanning in a 3T Siemens scanner. While viewing cues or control images, participants were instructed either to "allow yourself to crave" or "resist craving." Data were analyzed with FSL 4.1.5, focused on the smoking cues versus neutral cues contrast, using cluster thresholding (Z>2.3 and corrected cluster threshold of p=0.05) at the individual and group levels. During the Crave Condition activation was seen the left anterior cingulated cortex (LACC), medial prefrontal cortex, left middle cingulate gyrus, bilateral posterior cingulated gyrus and bilateral precuneus, areas associated with attention, decision-making and episodic memory. The LACC and areas of the prefrontal cortex associated with higher executive functioning were activated during the Resist Condition. No clear distinctions between group crave and resist analyses as a whole were seen without taking into account specific strategies used to resist the urge to smoke, supporting the idea that craving is associated with some degree of resisting the urge to smoke, and trying to resist is almost always accompanied by some degree of craving. Different strategies for resisting, such as distraction, activated different regions. Understanding the underlying neurobiology of resisting craving to smoke may identify new foci for treatments.
Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 2018
Cigarette craving contributes substantially to the maintenance of tobacco use disorder. Behavioral strategies to regulate craving may facilitate smoking cessation but remain underexplored. We adapted an emotion-regulation strategy, using proximal/distal self-positioning, to the context of cigarette craving to examine craving regulation in 42, daily smokers (18-25 years old). After overnight abstinence from smoking, before and after smoking their first cigarette of the day, participants viewed videos of natural scenes presenting young adults who were either smoking cigarettes ("smoke") or not ("non-smoke"). Before each video, participants were instructed to imagine themselves either immersed in the scene ("close") or distanced from it ("far"). They rated their craving after each video. Task-based fMRI data are presented for a subsample of participants (N = 21). We found main effects of smoking, instruction, and video type on craving-lower ratin...
Addiction Biology, 2012
ABSTRACTa db_449 1..10 Numerous research groups are now using analysis of blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) results and relaying back information about regional activity in their brains to participants in the scanner in 'real time'. In this study, we explored the feasibility of self-regulation of frontal cortical activation using real-time fMRI (rtfMRI) neurofeedback in nicotine-dependent cigarette smokers during exposure to smoking cues. Ten cigarette smokers were shown smoking-related visual cues in a 3 Tesla MRI scanner to induce their nicotine craving. Participants were instructed to modify their craving using rtfMRI feedback with two different approaches. In a 'reduce craving' paradigm, participants were instructed to 'reduce' their craving, and decrease the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) activity. In a separate 'increase resistance' paradigm, participants were asked to increase their resistance to craving and to increase middle prefrontal cortex (mPFC) activity. We found that participants were able to significantly reduce the BOLD signal in the ACC during the 'reduce craving' task (P = 0.028). There was a significant correlation between decreased ACC activation and reduced craving ratings during the 'reduce craving' session (P = 0.011). In contrast, there was no modulation of the BOLD signal in mPFC during the 'increase resistance' session. These preliminary results suggest that some smokers may be able to use neurofeedback via rtfMRI to voluntarily regulate ACC activation and temporarily reduce smoking cue-induced craving. Further research is needed to determine the optimal parameters of neurofeedback rtfMRI, and whether it might eventually become a therapeutic tool for nicotine dependence.
Human brain mapping, 2017
Although the activation of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and the striatum had been found in smoking cue induced craving task, whether and how the functional interactions and white matter integrity between these brain regions contribute to craving processing during smoking cue exposure remains unknown. Twenty-five young male smokers and 26 age- and gender-matched nonsmokers participated in the smoking cue-reactivity task. Craving related brain activation was extracted and psychophysiological interactions (PPI) analysis was used to specify the PFC-efferent pathways contributed to smoking cue-induced craving. Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and probabilistic tractography was used to explore whether the fiber connectivity strength facilitated functional coupling of the circuit with the smoking cue-induced craving. The PPI analysis revealed the negative functional coupling of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and the caudate during smoking cue induced craving task, which posit...
Neural Substrates of Abstinence-Induced Cigarette Cravings in Chronic Smokers
Journal of Neuroscience, 2007
Craving is a hallmark of drug dependence, including dependence on nicotine. Many studies have examined the neural substrates of cravings elicited by smoking-related cues. Less is known about the neural basis of unprovoked, abstinence-induced cravings, despite the contributions of such cravings to smoking relapse. To fill this gap, we used arterial spin labeled (ASL) perfusion MRI to characterize the neural substrates of abstinence-induced cravings to smoke. Fifteen chronic smokers were scanned during a resting state on two separate occasions: (1) smoking satiety and (2) abstinence (following ≥ 12 hours of smoking deprivation), in counterbalanced order. Smoking abstinence state (vs. satiety) was associated with increased cerebral blood flow (CBF) in anterior cingulate cortex (ACC)/medial orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) and left OFC. Abstinence-induced cravings to smoke were predicted by CBF increases (abstinence minus satiety) in: right OFC, right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), occipital cortex, ACC, ventral striatum/nucleus accumbens, thalamus, amygdala, bilateral hippocampus, left caudate, and right insula. These data suggest that increased activation in the brain's visuospatial and reward circuitry underlies abstinence-induced cravings to smoke, and thereby, may be important in relapse.
Neural circuitry of impulsivity in a cigarette craving paradigm
Impulsivity has been shown to play a pivotal role in the onset, pattern of consumption, relapse and, most notably, craving of illicit and licit drugs such as cigarette smoking. The goal of this study was to examine the neurobiological influence of trait impulsivity during cue-induced cigarette craving. Thirty-one chronic smokers passively viewed appetitive smoking-related and neutral images while being scanned and reported their feelings of craving. They completed the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale, a measure of trait impulsivity. We conducted functional connectivity analyses using the psycho-physiological interaction method. During the processing of smoking stimuli, participants presented increased activations in the cingulate and prefrontal cortices. We observed a significant positive relationship between impulsivity scores and reported craving. A negative correlation was observed between the impulsivity score and activity in the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC). The insula, dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) as well as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) presented a negative connectivity with the PCC. Consistent with the view that the PCC is related to the ability to resist cigarette craving, our results suggest that high impulsive smokers have greater difficulty in controlling their cravings, and that this weakness may be mediated by lower PCC activity. Moreover, we argue that the less PCC activity, the greater the probability of a stronger emotional, physiological, and biased attentional response to smoking cues mediated by insula, dACC, and DLPFC activity. This is the first study on this topic, and so, results will need to be replicated in both licit and illicit drug abusers. Our findings also highlight a need for more emphasis on the PCC in drug addiction research, as it is one of the most consistently activated regions in functional magnetic resonance imaging studies examining the neural correlates of cue-induced alcohol, drug, and tobacco cravings.
Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, 2004
In untreated smokers, exposure to cigarette-related cues increases both the intensity of cigarette craving and relative glucose metabolism of the perigenual/ventral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). Given that treatment with bupropion HCl reduces overall cigarette craving levels in nicotine dependent subjects, we performed a preliminary study of smokers to determine if bupropion HCl treatment attenuates cue-induced cigarette craving and associated brain metabolic activation. Thirtyseven, otherwise healthy smokers (20 untreated and 17 who had received open-label treatment with bupropion HCl) underwent two 18 F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography scanning sessions in randomized order-one when presented with neutral cues and the other when presented with cigarette-related cues. Bupropion-treated smokers had smaller cigarette cue-induced increases in craving scores on the Urge to Smoke (UTS) Scale and less activation of perigenual/ventral ACC metabolism from the neutral to the cigarette cue scan than untreated smokers. Thus, in addition to its known effects on spontaneous cigarette craving and withdrawal symptoms, bupropion HCl diminishes cue-induced cigarette craving and appears to attenuate cigarette cue-induced ACC activation. These results are consistent with the known effects of bupropion HCl, including its enhancement of catecholaminergic neurotransmission.
Involvement of action-related brain regions in nicotine addiction
Journal of Neurophysiology, 2011
Yalachkov Y, Naumer MJ. Involvement of action-related brain regions in nicotine addiction. The study of Wagner et al. (J Neurosci 31: 894 -898, 2011) reveals the neural correlates of spontaneously activated action representations in smokers when subjects watch movie characters smoke. We stress the importance of differentiating how these representations are activated: while the anterior intraparietal sulcus and inferior frontal gyrus are part of the mirror neuron system of smokers, the middle frontal gyrus, premotor cortex, and superior parietal lobule represent the smokingrelated tool use skills and action knowledge activated by smoking paraphernalia.
Instructed smoking expectancy modulates cue‐elicited neural activity: A preliminary study
Nicotine & Tobacco Research, 2005
In recent years, research applying functional neuroimaging to the study of cue-elicited drug craving has emerged. This research has begun to identify a distributed system of brain activity during drug craving. A review of this literature suggested that expectations regarding the opportunity to use a drug affected the pattern of neural responses elicited by drug cues. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we examined the effects of smoking expectancy on the neural response to neutral (e.g., roll of tape) and smoking-related (a cigarette) stimuli in male cigarette smokers deprived of nicotine for 8 hr. As predicted, several brain regions (e.g., the anterior cingulate cortex) exhibited differential activation during cigarette versus neutral cue exposure. Moreover, we found that subregions of the prefrontal cortex (i.e., ventromedial, ventrolateral, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortices) showed cue-elicited activation that was modulated by smoking expectancy. These results highlight the importance of perceived drug use opportunity in the neurobiological response to drug cues.
Neuropsychopharmacology, 2005
Drug cues have been shown to activate brain regions involved in attention, motivation, and reward in addicted users. However, as studies have typically measured responses in only one state (ie drug abstinence), it is unclear whether observed activations represent amplification by abstinence or stable responses. Thus, the present study was designed to evaluate the stability of event-related responses to visual drug cues in dependent smokers (n = 13) using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging measures. Imaging was conducted following smoking as usual and following overnight abstinence, and self-reported craving measures were obtained before, during, and after scanning. Analysis of hemodynamic response (HDR) amplitudes in each of 13 regions of interest revealed larger responses to smoking compared to control cues in ventral anterior cingulate gyrus (vACG) and superior frontal gyrus. Responses to smoking cues in these and all other regions revealed no effects of abstinence/satiety, thus supporting the notion that cue-elicited brain responses are relatively stable. However, while the abstinence manipulation did not alter group-level responses to smoking cues, at the individual level, abstinence-induced changes in craving (abstinence minus satiety) were positively correlated with changes in HDR amplitude to smoking cues in frontal regions including left inferior frontal gyrus, left vACG, and bilateral middle frontal gyrus. These results suggest that brain responses to smoking cues, while relatively stable at the group level following short-term abstinence, may be modulated by individual differences in craving in response to abstinenceparticularly in regions subserving attention and motivation.