Vaping for nicotine advantages?

[mosspa]

Gee, I had no idea I was missed I would like to let everyone with interest in this thread know that I didn't intentionally leave it for any reason. I'm still getting used to the way that this forum software works. Almost every other forum I subscribe to notifies me when anybody posts to it, whether or not I have recently signed on or posted to it. I have been told by some moderator, I think, that whether of not I see activity here is dependent on my visiting the forum. Consequently, I have missed most of what precedes this (on page 25, for me). I haven't yet developed a habit for logging in occasionally.

As to my self experiment, I recently concluded another 3-month no-nicotine phase. The last week in May, me and several of my students traveled to Budapest to present our most recent EEG data at a neuroscience meeting. I knew I would be traveling in eastern Europe for several weeks, so I started the no-nicotine phase on May 27, two days before before leaving on the trip. I started teaching again last week, so consequently, the off-phase was just a little shy of three months. Anyway, this concludes three replicates and I am convinced that I have not experienced withdrawal effects. One thing I did think about this time, that I really hadn't done previously, was to look at the possibility of the occurrence of rebound effects, i.e., where symptoms that were presumably reduced by nicotine occur at greater intensity or at a higher rate than baseline. For those who haven't read about it earlier in the thread, I have been evaluating the number of brief memory lapses, "senior moments", tip-of-the-tongue episodes, etc., that I exhibit when I am publicly speaking (lecturing, etc.). Generally, since I don't teach during the summer, I can make no real comparison as far as my specific dependent variables are concerned. However, my meeting presentation occurred three days after I stopped vaping, so I was able to collect some comparative data. Knowing that I was pharmacokinetically free of nicotine, I was a little apprehensive before the presentation. It went well (better than I expected, with no slurs, stops, or "senior moments"). While it is only one data point, it does suggest to me that a rebound effect did not occur, and even more interestingly, there may be a residual effect that is independent of nicotine bioavailability ( i.e., at least 24 half-lives). This result is consistent with that from some continine research [e.g., Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics (1994) 55, 581–590]. So, I'm going to think of some way to assess that.

I notice some of the recent discussion in this thread involves nicotine-related insomnia. I am an insomniac, and I have found no negative effects of nicotine on my sleep. I also believe there may be a positive effect, because since when I'm vaping I feel more energized when I wake up then I do when om off nicotine. There are confounds in my case because I use alcohol as a sleep aid, so the last thing I do at night is drink a few glasses of wine and vape. Although I have no evidence, I think that my early sleep stage cycling may be improved from the preponderance of slow-wave sleep during the early part of sleep one normally sees after ethanol consumption.

 

[choochoogranny]

Exactly why I have one or two glasses of wine with dinner.......and usually asleep no later than 9 p.m. Do also reduce my nicotine amount by half before dinner.

Glad to see you back, Mosspa.

 

[OldBatty]

If you skip a notice it quits sending them for that thread even if you are subscribed. This has bit me several times on the funny picture thread... Unless someone else PM'd you there is apparently a timer where it turns back on?

I was also motivated by the threat of this thread locking due to inactivity. Be a shame if this thread got locked!

Oh, welcome back!!!

 

[sofarsogood]

Welcome back. There are chemists who contribute to the forum. That's useful. You are the only neuroscientist. It's fun to pick your brain.

My perception about my sleep is I sleep better, a lot better, since quitting smoking. It's hard to say if nicotine plays a role or may be being healthier promotes better sleep. Part of how I know I'm sleeping better is more vivid dreams that typically wake me up. Those are more frequent if I'm well rested. A little secret, if you want more vivid memorable dreaming just sleep when you're not tired. I believe kids have more dream issues because they are routinely pushed to get a lot of sleep which may be sometimes they need and sometimes they don't.

Some researcher, at UofM I think, noticed a surprising number of kids claiming they vape zero nic. If the appeal of vaping or smoking to never smokers is visual that makes sense. Vaping clouds are way better than smoking clouds and nic is not important if you never smoked. So the kid can say, well there's no nicotine so what's your beef now? Touche!

 

[choochoogranny]

Oh, forgot to say I also prep for bed by plastering a BreatheRight strip on my nose. When I smoked it was necessary; but I guess I got use to it. Love sleeping with my mouth closed and waking up without "cotton mouth."

 

[DavidOck]

Good to see you back!

I notice some of the recent discussion in this thread involves nicotine-related insomnia. I am an insomniac, and I have found no negative effects of nicotine on my sleep.

The only times I ever had negative sleep effects from nic were the 3 times I went through the whole patch sequence. Especially if I put it on at night, and suffered a night of mares....

I vape at 18, and, just like when I smoked, I'll vape 'till I'm in the rack.

If you skip a notice it quits sending them for that thread even if you are subscribed. This has bit me several times on the funny picture thread... Unless someone else PM'd you there is apparently a timer where it turns back on?

You can set your preferences globally, or thread by thread, to get an email notice of activity, or just look top right on the screen at "alerts" for notifications of activity. One notice/alert per thread, of activity since your last "read" of that thread. Of course, if you clear your alerts and don't read the thread, you don't get new notices, since you've not been in the thread to reset it.

 

[mosspa]

If you skip a notice it quits sending them for that thread even if you are subscribed. This has bit me several times on the funny picture thread... Unless someone else PM'd you there is apparently a timer where it turns back on?

Thanks for that info. Does just looking at the thread reset the notifier, or do you have to post something?

 

[OldBatty]

Just looking is enough.

 

[gerrymi]

2 more...

Study finds nicotine safe, helps in Alzheimer's, Parkinson's


The Secret Health Benefits of Nicotine They Don’t Want You To Know


..

 

[penstyle]

Wow, good thread.

 

[Semiretired]

The Secret Health Benefits of Nicotine They Don’t Want You To Know

This is a very good article...

 

[choochoogranny]

Thank you, Gerrymi. Am in my 70's now and those studies you listed affirm my decision to keep vaping with low dose nicotine........provided I can keep filling my tanks and making my coils!

 

[sofarsogood]

Thanks for that info. Does just looking at the thread reset the notifier, or do you have to post something?

Some UofM researchers report most kids the surveyed claimed there is no nic in their e liquid. Why was this overlooked so long. The attraction of smoking or vaping to kids who never smoked would be visual. Vaping wins because the clouds are much bigger. (Is 'fire breathing' primordial?) So if there is no nic there is no chemical to create dependence. So now what? But my question is, is the visual appeal of vaping or smoking within the realm of neuroscience?

 

[MacTechVpr]

…(Is 'fire breathing' primordial?) So if there is no nic there is no chemical to create dependence. So now what? But my question is, is the visual appeal of vaping or smoking within the realm of neuroscience?

I think we're hard-wired towards communal behavior and all the activities associated with it as a matter of survival. The experts must certainly know this and it's loathsome that they should play upon such instincts to manipulate us. We must stop letting government play our friend on the one hand and tinker with our individual choice on the other. We can describe such behavior too as far more despicable than addiction.

I was never addicted. But definitely conflicted by the propaganda.

Good luck.

 

[sofarsogood]

I think we're hard-wired towards communal behavior and all the activities associated with it as a matter of survival. The experts must certainly know this and it's loathsome that they should play upon such instincts to manipulate us. We must stop letting government play our friend on the one hand and tinker with our individual choice on the other. We can describe such behavior too as far more despicable than addiction.

I was never addicted. But definitely conflicted by the propaganda.

Good luck.

It is easy to say smoking is about more than nicotine but not so easy to investigate when the only thing available to make smoke was tobacco. People are vaping for a lot of different reasons. It's easier to learn about those reasons when you can have big clouds or zero visible vapor or lots of flavor or no flavor or lot of nic or no nic and people are choosing all of those extremes.

 

[mosspa]

Some UofM researchers report most kids the surveyed claimed there is no nic in their e liquid. Why was this overlooked so long. The attraction of smoking or vaping to kids who never smoked would be visual. Vaping wins because the clouds are much bigger. (Is 'fire breathing' primordial?) So if there is no nic there is no chemical to create dependence. So now what? But my question is, is the visual appeal of vaping or smoking within the realm of neuroscience?

Since my post concerning the behavior of this forum's software which was replied to with the quote, above, I must say I'm confused as to what this is a response to. However, I'll reply to it anyway.

(1) kids vaping with no nicotine is not providing them any cognitive benefit. Since we know next to nothing about the health consequences of frequent deep inhalation of anything in flavored juice except propylene glycol, glycerin and maybe menthol, by anybody, and since we know absolutely nothing about the long term consequences of children vaping ANYTHING, children should strongly discouraged from vaping, and if they are allowed to vape, there should be no flavors, and the juice should contain nicotine. Otherwise, what would be the point. Fun?

(2) since there is no evidence that nicotine leads to any kind of dependence that can't be more easily explained by the habitual procedure by which it is administered, nicotine in vape should not even be evaluated in the hazards of vaping by most children, because it is the one thing that is inhaled that probably doesn't pose a potential danger to them (if they don't have relatively severe cardiovascular problems, and with today's fat kids, this may be a sufficient reason for them not to vape nicotine).

(3) In answer to the question at the end of the quote. Yes! But, as for all of the research on people who start smoking as children, I would be very surprised if peer pressure wasn't the reason for starting to vape as well. For example, it is unlikely that a child is going to do some perusal of the scientific literature and conclude that vaping nicotine may give them a cognitive advantage in school.

On a related topic... I gave my blind semesterly questionnaire concerning psychostimulant use to my three classes of with a total of 141 university students [51 freshmen, 4 sophomores, 34 Juniors, 52 Seniors]. Of the 131 that returned the cards 58 (44%) of the students copped to using prescription psychostimulants for cognitive enhancement to obtain an academic advantage (49% of the freshmen, 43% of the juniors, and 38% of the seniors, who returned the cards). This is up substantially from last fall. Of the 58 students, almost 47% had obtained prescriptions through their family physicians, and of those, only 9% went to the physicians complaining of ADHD-like symptoms. It is alarming that over 50% of my students using prescription psychostimulants are not purchasing them in drugstores.

 

[sofarsogood]

Since my post concerning the behavior of this forum's software which was replied to with the quote, above, I must say I'm confused as to what this is a response to. However, I'll reply to it anyway.

(1) kids vaping with no nicotine is not providing them any cognitive benefit. Since we know next to nothing about the health consequences of frequent deep inhalation of anything in flavored juice except propylene glycol, glycerin and maybe menthol, by anybody, and since we know absolutely nothing about the long term consequences of children vaping ANYTHING, children should strongly discouraged from vaping, and if they are allowed to vape, there should be no flavors, and the juice should contain nicotine. Otherwise, what would be the point. Fun?

(2) since there is no evidence that nicotine leads to any kind of dependence that can't be more easily explained by the habitual procedure by which it is administered, nicotine in vape should not even be evaluated in the hazards of vaping by most children, because it is the one thing that is inhaled that probably doesn't pose a potential danger to them (if they don't have relatively severe cardiovascular problems, and with today's fat kids, this may be a sufficient reason for them not to vape nicotine).

(3) In answer to the question at the end of the quote. Yes! But, as for all of the research on people who start smoking as children, I would be very surprised if peer pressure wasn't the reason for starting to vape as well. For example, it is unlikely that a child is going to do some perusal of the scientific literature and conclude that vaping nicotine may give them a cognitive advantage in school.

On a related topic... I gave my blind semesterly questionnaire concerning psychostimulant use to my three classes of with a total of 141 university students [51 freshmen, 4 sophomores, 34 Juniors, 52 Seniors]. Of the 131 that returned the cards 58 (44%) of the students copped to using prescription psychostimulants for cognitive enhancement to obtain an academic advantage (49% of the freshmen, 43% of the juniors, and 38% of the seniors, who returned the cards). This is up substantially from last fall. Of the 58 students, almost 47% had obtained prescriptions through their family physicians, and of those, only 9% went to the physicians complaining of ADHD-like symptoms. It is alarming that over 50% of my students using prescription psychostimulants are not purchasing them in drugstores.

I quoted your most recent post only because it was the most recent. Taking out the moral dimension, peer influence is how people learn productive habits too. Kids learn to play from other kids. Not all play is healthy or desirable from a grownup point of view. You didn't quite get to my question. Does the field of neuroscience look at behavior even when there is no external chemistry in the mix, like kids vaping purely as a form of play because without nicotine what else can it be?

Isn't it just a teeny weeny bit ironic that you have been experimenting with a drug to enhance cognative function and your students are doing the same thing but going you one better with some pharma drug? I did not know there are drugs kids might take to get better grades. In my day we just wanted to get stoned but, then, student loans hadn't been invented yet.

 

[retired1]

Let's be careful where we're going with this please.

As a reminder: Why we don't allow drug talk

 

[mosspa]

I quoted your most recent post only because it was the most recent. Taking out the moral dimension, peer influence is how people learn productive habits too. Kids learn to play from other kids. Not all play is healthy or desirable from a grownup point of view. You didn't quite get to my question. Does the field of neuroscience look at behavior even when there is no external chemistry in the mix, like kids vaping purely as a form of play because without nicotine what else can it be?

OK! So the answer to the question you just posed is 'yes'. In fact there is a recently defined branch known as "Affective Neuroscience" that addresses this. There is a book, the first edition of which was published in the later 90s, called "Affective Neuroscience". It was written by Jaak Panksepp, and has become the standard "textbook" for university courses that address the area. One of the major concepts addressed in the book is the evolutionary significance of, and the functioning of "play" as it relates to socialization, as a primary reinforcer. That is, access to play will strengthen any behavior on which it it is contingent. It is a primary reinforcer, because it doesn't require a prior association with another primary reinforcer for it to be effective (i.e., it doesn't have to be associated with food, sex, water, etc). Panksepp was the first person to determine this (in a number of mammal species, most notably juvenile rats), and has been working on elucidating the neural "underpinnings" of play behavior for the last 35 years, using rat brain models. It's a fascinating area of study. The relationship of "play" to learning, functions like any other reinforcer. According to Panksepp, an animal will engage in behaviors that maximally stimulate the substrates of the brain that ultimately lead to some interaction with the release of dopamine and the activation of the nucleus accumbens (a specific brain area that is involved in the reinforcing consequence of all goal oriented behaviors). That is, any activity that results in "reward". So, in the case of juvenile rats, that behavior is "rough and tumble play". Where the rats appear to be wrestling, and the dependent measure is specified as number of "pins" (yes, topographically similar to what one sees in human wrestling). As for any primary reinforcer, deprivation of access to play leads to an increase in pins, and the behavior shows satiation over duration of the "bouts of play". In the mid-90s, at about the time of the writing of the book, Panksepp's lab determined the existence of very specific ultrasonic vocalizations emitted by the rats when they were engaging in play (or even when they were being tickled, leading to the odd construct "rat laughter") Here's a YouTube video of Panksepp explaining the finding.

 

[sofarsogood]

OK! So the answer to the question you just posed is 'yes'. In fact there is a recently defined branch known as "Affective Neuroscience" that addresses this. There is a book, the first edition of which was published in the later 90s, called "Affective Neuroscience". It was written by Jaak Panksepp, and has become the standard "textbook" for university courses that address the area. One of the major concepts addressed in the book is the evolutionary significance of, and the functioning of "play" as it relates to socialization, as a primary reinforcer. That is, access to play will strengthen any behavior on which it it is contingent. It is a primary reinforcer, because it doesn't require a prior association with another primary reinforcer for it to be effective (i.e., it doesn't have to be associated with food, sex, water, etc). Panksepp was the first person to determine this (in a number of mammal species, most notably juvenile rats), and has been working on elucidating the neural "underpinnings" of play behavior for the last 35 years, using rat brain models. It's a fascinating area of study. The relationship of "play" to learning, functions like any other reinforcer. According to Panksepp, an animal will engage in behaviors that maximally stimulate the substrates of the brain that ultimately lead to some interaction with the release of dopamine and the activation of the nucleus accumbens (a specific brain area that is involved in the reinforcing consequence of all goal oriented behaviors). That is, any activity that results in "reward". So, in the case of juvenile rats, that behavior is "rough and tumble play". Where the rats appear to be wrestling, and the dependent measure is specified as number of "pins" (yes, topographically similar to what one sees in human wrestling). As for any primary reinforcer, deprivation of access to play leads to an increase in pins, and the behavior shows satiation over duration of the "bouts of play". In the mid-90s, at about the time of the writing of the book, Panksepp's lab determined the existence of very specific ultrasonic vocalizations emitted by the rats when they were engaging in play (or even when they were being tickled, leading to the odd construct "rat laughter") Here's a YouTube video of Panksepp explaining the finding.

Thank you thank you. Most of us just want to vape in peace and buy some new cloud toys once in a while but apparently, to earn the right to do that, we have to save the children while we're at it. But may be the children aren't doing so bad at protecting themselves. A reputable UofM research group recently found a lot of kids who vape claiming there is no nic in their vape. Which leads to the question, well if not nicotine then what? I think the 'what' is visual, applies to smoking and vaping and vaping is trouncing smoking because the clouds are far superior and if you're interest is smoke tricks, and avoiding nicotine might shut up the grownups, then why not leave it out? The next question might be what happens to the cloud chasing kids in the longer run?

I had a business for a few years whose customers were adolescent boys. (There might even be a few people here who remember CDS Detroit.) A lot of them like to do things that require skills and they tend to take risks. (The smart thing to do with a 14 year old boy is lock him in his room til he turns 15. I would promote helmets by saying it's a lot harder to get a girlfriend if you drool.) The problem with having adolescent males as your customers is the twin curses of cars and women. They grow up and move on. Their childhood toys end up in the back of the closet and their little brothers don't follow in their footsteps.

So, finally, will those zero nic teen vapers stick with it lifelong (which may or may not be a health issue) or outgrow it like all the other stuff that interested them as kids and didn't last?

P.S. And I wached the video. Fun science. When I introduced people to riding horses I would say the horse is not stupid. He has different priorities and he knows interesting things that you don't.