subject: Is Smoking a Physical Addiction [print this page] Author: Ross Jacky Author: Ross Jacky
The reason behind addiction to smoking is one of a psychological one rather than a physical one. The substance, nicotine, is portrayed as the ultimate evil or the guilty party that makes quitting cigarettes a difficult proposition for some, and impossible for still some others. According to Dr. David Williams, nicotine, the chemical substance found in cigarettes smoke kindles the creation of acetylcholine which facilitates the communication of nerve impulses. These are many reasons people give for continuing with the habit of smoking. They say, it seems to improve their memory, lifts their general spirit and soothes the nerve. Since most of the smokers are not getting enough nutrition, researchers are of the opinion that one of the things that fuel smoking tendency is a Vitamin B3 deficiency. Vitamin B3 is a water soluble vitamin and is not stored in the body and has to be replaced constantly. This is to say that people just do not get addicted to vitamins. Rather, it is just an indicator that the tendency to smoke is not an addiction to nicotine. Let us take the case of addiction to pain relievers. When the patient thinks that he is not getting the same results from the usual dose of pain relievers, he may increase the dose, which for a brief time is bound to give him relief. It will not be long before he has to increase the intake again. This is what that happens in the case of chemical addiction also. The human body system views the new substance as something that throws it off balance and will create a force to counter it. If nicotine, the so-called culprit was a truly addictive substance, smokers would have to keep on increasing its dose in order to achieve the same degree of effects as in the drug example. And, the consumption of tobacco cigarettes would have definitely increased over time. However, this has not been happening. A very clear pointer to the fact that tobacco cigarettes are only psychologically addictive and not physically addictive is given by the situation of the typical smoker settling into a pattern and staying there for many months and years. One will be able to find a half-a-pack a day person, a full pack a day person, a one-and-a-half pack a day person, a two packs a day person and even a three packs a day person. This figure gets established pretty early in his smoking lifestyle and in all possibility will stay that way. There could be slight fluctuations in the average, and that is it. If cigarettes had the property of making a person physically addictive, that person would have been smoking more and more cigarettes to achieve the relief as had been claimed; but it is not happening. So, one can conclude that cigarette consumption is regulated by the Psychological Smoking Mechanism and not at all by the chemicals contained in cigarettes. About the Author:
