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 Most adult smokers say they want to quit, and many try. But about
half of smokers who attempt to stop smoking relapse within two
weeks, researchers note in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology.
"There are many approaches that people use for smoking cessation,
including nicotine products (e.g., nicotine gum, nicotine patch),
medication, and behavioral approaches such as cognitive behavioral
therapy and meditation," said lead study author Michael Sayette, a
psychology researcher at the University of Pittsburgh.
"But quitting smoking remains an awfully difficult challenge and
novel approaches, either alone or in conjunction with existing
interventions, are sorely needed," Sayette said by email.
The current study tested one novel option - using smokers' cravings
for certain appealing smells - in 232 smokers who weren't trying to
quit or using any other tobacco-replacement products like nicotine
gum or e-cigarettes.
Researchers asked participants not to smoke for eight hours prior to
the experiment and required them to bring a pack of their preferred
cigarettes and a lighter with them to the lab.
Upon arrival, the people first smelled and rated a number of
different odors generally considered to be pleasant like chocolate,
apple, peppermint and vanilla, or unpleasant, like a
mushroom-derived chemical. Participants also smelled one odor from
tobacco leaves, and an odorless product that served as "blank" or
neutral scent for comparison.
Then, researchers asked participants to light a cigarette and hold
it in their hands, but not smoke it. After 10 seconds, the
participants verbally rated their urge to smoke on a scale of 1 to
100 before extinguishing the cigarette and putting it in an ashtray.
The participants then opened a container that held either the scent
they had rated most pleasurable, the scent of tobacco or no scent
and sniffed it once, then again rated their urge to smoke. They
continued to sniff the container they were given as much as they
wanted for the next five minutes, rating their urge to smoke every
60 seconds.
The average craving score just after lighting the cigarette was
82.13. Then, regardless of what odor they smelled, all participants
experienced a decreased urge to smoke after sniffing the container,
but the average craving scores for those who smelled pleasant odors
dropped significantly more. With a pleasant odor, craving scores
dropped by an average 19.3 points, with a tobacco odor they dropped
11.7 points and with the blank, by 11.2 points.
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"Although five minutes may not seem like a long time, it may be
sufficient to offer smokers a critical window to rethink what they
are doing and perhaps leave a situation where the risk of relapse is
high," Sayette said.
"While it is premature to note definitively how olfactory cues
affect patients, as our participants were not trying to quit
smoking, we do think the results are intriguing and support the need
to further investigate why and for whom olfactory cues might be
effective," Sayette added.
"To what extent do I think this approach might be an effective
option for helping people smoke fewer cigarettes in the real world -
it is certainly worthy of further study," Dr. Judith Prochaska, a
researcher at Stanford University in California who wasn't involved
in the study, said by email.
"Unknown is whether the effects can be replicated outside of the lab
setting (out in the real world) and whether the scents can sustain
their effects over time," Prochaska added.
Repeated exposure to the same pleasant smells might eventually
diminish any effect on cigarette cravings, said Timothy Baker, a
researcher at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and
Public Health in Madison who wasn't involved in the study.
"It might be worth a try for smokers who are trying (to quit) to try
to sniff a strong pleasant odor when they have an urge and see if it
works for them," Baker said by email. "However, they should not use
this strategy instead of using treatments that we know work."
SOURCE: https://bit.ly/2GncGMw Journal of Abnormal Psychology,
online April 15, 2019.
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