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Effects of nicotine
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It acts on male and female brains differently.
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NICOTINE ACTS on male and female brains differently, a new study has concluded. But oddly enough, it found that one of the drug's major effects was to make women's brains work more like men's.
According to research, to be published in The International Journal of Neuropsychopharma-cology, earlier work established differences in cigarette use: women tend to take fewer and shorter puffs and have less success with nicotine replacement therapy, and are more affected by "cues" that set off a desire to smoke.
To look for a biological basis for the differences, the researchers gave a group of 119 smokers and non-smokers tests while their brain activity was being monitored. With the placebo patch, women generated more brain activity than men, particularly in areas that govern attention, mood, short-term memory and task organisation.
When the subjects were given nicotine, these differences diminished greatly: brain metabolism decreased among women and increased in men.
The lead researcher, Stephen G. Potkin of the University of California, Irvine, said the findings suggested a biological difference in the way nicotine is metabolised.
That means that differences in smoking patterns and in quitting may have a biological basis and not be just "a consequence of different ways of inhaling or a different number of cigarettes smoked," he said.
Photo: Bijoy Ghosh
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