title: Effects of situational demands on the direction of electrodermal activation during smoking.
abstract: Task demands (normal smoking; sham smoking; smoking or non-smoking during complex cognitive performance; and, smoking or non-smoking during monotonous vigilance performance) were manipulated in three experiments. Smoking increased electrodermal activity (EDA) arousal from pre-smoking baseline. Sham smoking (as a control for motoric aspects) also increased EDA arousal but to a lesser degree. In contrast the demands of complex cognitive performance were associated with lower EDA arousal during smoking than during non-smoking. Finally, during vigilance performance smoking maintained EDA arousal which during non-smoking decreased. Smoking did not improve performance during complex cognitive processing or vigilance above deprivation performance levels. It was concluded that smoking did have bidirectional effects as a function of task demand. However, there was no evidence that these physiological changes were functional and the smoking behavior data gave no indication as to the cause of these changes.
authors: Department of Psychology, Portsmouth University, Hampshire, UK.
authors: P H
authors: PH
authors: Morris
authors: A
authors: A
authors: Gale
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001143:Arousal; D003071:Cognition; D005260:Female; D005712:Galvanic Skin Response; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012907:Smoking; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis