Attentional shifts to smoking cues in smokers.

What Was Tested

Researchers studied the intervention named in the title in this randomized controlled trial publication.

Many theories of addiction assume that responses to drug cues maintain drug use and precipitate relapse.

There is evidence that measures derived from experimental cognitive psychology yield important information about cue reactivity.

The researchers used a pictorial version of the visual probe task to evaluate: (i) whether minimally deprived smokers attend differentially to smoking cues (attentional bias); (ii) whether this bias is related to self-reported craving and dependence; and (iii) whether it predicted outcome in a subsequent cessation attempt.

Who Took Part

The age groups tagged for this paper are adults and middle-aged adults, both men and women.

Participants took part in a structured smoking cessation program.

Each participant completed the visual probe task roughly 2 weeks before quitting while non-deprived.

How the Study Was Run

The researchers set it up as a randomized and double-blind study.

The participants were allocated by chance, so the intervention group and the comparison group should start out alike.

As a double-blind study, the assignments were hidden from both participants and investigators until the end.

A research smoking cessation clinic.

141 heavy smokers seeking treatment for smoking cessation.

The computerized attentional bias measure and self-reported urge were taken in a laboratory session.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Attention, Cues, Nicotine, Smoking, Smoking Cessation and Tobacco Use Disorder.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized and double-blind study.

Its findings take up roughly 4 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2003 (Addiction (Abingdon, England)), a journal based in England.

More context: all human trials.