Young people react differently from adults facing the cigarette? They may become addicted to the same extent? A study conducted among American teenagers suggests that addiction mechanisms are involved earlier than previously thought.
The team of Dr. Joseph DiFranza (Worcester) is undertaking a survey of 700 youth aged 12 to 13 living in Massachusetts. The results observed in 95 young people, who acknowledged occasional smoking, just published in the journal "Tobacco Control" , and they really do not encourage optimism.
Signs of addiction in a few weeks
The teenagers were interviewed in great detail three times on their smoking habits. Two thirds of those young smokers had symptoms of addiction to nicotine, which is reflected most often by a strong sense of addiction and a compelling urge to smoke, but also by irritability and anxiety. At fifth of these adolescents, addiction signs had appeared in the first four weeks of the first cigarette consumption. However, several college students said they felt the first manifestations of dependency in just days.
cerebral action
These results have not surprised the authors of this work, who have specialized for several years in the study of smoking among young Americans. As they point out, various scientific studies have shown that the number of receptors to nicotine rises considerably in the brain when the administration of a second dose of nicotine. By interacting with more receivers, this substance could therefore cause brain changes very quickly. This would explain why there is no need for daily smokers to become addicted.
Three types of youth
However, to the researchers, if addiction is common among younger smokers, even when smoking very little, all adolescents do not develop a dependency in the same way. For these scientists, teens smoking actually fall into three distinct categories. Beside young immediately becoming unconditional followers of the cigarette, there are also teenagers who become addicted to nicotine and more gradually higher doses. They gradually become regular smokers few years.