Abstract

Loss of sleep may impair the ability to abstain from drug use, through any of a number of mechanisms. Sleep loss may increase drug use by impairing attention and inhibitory control, increasing the value of drug rewards over other rewards, or by inducing mood states that facilitate use of a drug. In the present study, we examined whether sleep deprivation (SD) would increase smoking in cigarette smokers, and whether it would do so by impairing attention or inhibitory control. Healthy cigarette smokers (N=14) were tested in a two-session within subject study, after overnight SD or after a normal night's sleep. Subjects were tested in both conditions in randomized order, after abstaining from cigarettes for 48 hours. The procedure was designed to model the human relapse situation. On each 6-h laboratory session after sleep or no sleep, subjects completed mood and craving questionnaires, tasks measuring behavioral inhibition and attention, and a choice procedure in which they chose between money and smoking cigarettes. SD increased self-reported fatigue and decreased arousal, it increased the number of cigarettes subjects chose to smoke, impaired behavioral inhibition and attention. However, the impairments in inhibition or attention were not related to the increase in smoking. It is possible that SD increases smoking because smokers expect that it will reduce sleepiness. Thus, the findings suggest that sleep loss may increase the likelihood of smoking during abstinence not through inhibitory or attentional mechanisms but because of the potential of nicotine to reduce subjective sleepiness.