Quitting Smoking Improves Mood, Study Shows
A new study tracked the symptoms of depression in people who were trying to quit smoking and found that they were happier when they were being successful in not smoking, for however long that period lasted. Since many people believe that smoking helps ease anxiety and depression, this is an important finding that suggests the contrary.
Christopher Kahler, corresponding author and research professor of community health at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, said that their research suggests that smokers view quitting as a way to improve both their physical and mental health.
He added that many people assume that smoking has antidepressant properties; however, their study shows that people report fewer depression symptoms after they’ve quit smoking—even if they’ve only been successful for a little while.
Kahler and colleagues from Brown, The Miriam Hospital, and the University of Southern California examined a group of 236 men and women who wanted to quit smoking and who also happened to be heavy social drinkers. They were given nicotine patches and counseling and agreed to a quit date. Some were also given advice to reduce their drinking. The participants answered questions about depression symptoms a week before the quit date and then at 2, 8, 16, and 28 weeks after the quit date.
Ninety-nine subjects never abstained from smoking, 44 were only abstinent at the two-week assessment, 33 were abstinent at the 2 and 8-week followups, and 33 people abstained from smoking the entire time. Those who only quit temporarily had the most drastic change—they were happiest when they were abstinent, and plunged back into depression when they started smoking again, sometimes to even lower levels than when the study began. Kahler said that this suggests that increased happiness and abstaining from smoking are clearly associated.
Those who never abstained from smoking were the unhappiest overall, and those who quit and remained abstinent were the happiest overall. Although the smokers in this study drank and relatively high levels, Kahler said the study results can be generalized to most people. The results echo his 2002 study that looked at smokers who all had experienced depression but did not necessarily drink. The changes in happiness in the current study also didn’t correlate with reducing drinking—only with reducing smoking.
Kahler said that the study suggests that quitting smoking reduces symptoms of depression. If a person quits smoking, their depression decreases, and if they relapse, they return to being depressed—this is what an effective antidepressant should look like.
Source: Science Daily, Kicking the Habit: Study Suggests That Quitting Smoking Improves Mood, December 2, 2010
