Depression vulnerability, cigarette smoking, and the serotonin transporter gene
Section snippets
Participants
Participants (N=487, 279 women and 208 men) ranged in age from 18 to 90 (mean=34.98 years). The majority of participants were Caucasian (74%), while remaining participants were African American (11%), Asian American (7%), or “other” race (3%) or not reported. Five percent were of Hispanic ethnicity.
Subjects were recruited through advertisements requesting sibling pairs to participate in research on genetics, personality, and health-related behaviors. Participants were not screened for smoking
Sample characteristics
Participants were classified according to their smoking status as current everyday smokers (n=81), who had smoked more than 100 cigarettes and continue to smoke daily, current some day smokers (n=29), who had smoked more than 100 cigarettes and now smoke on some but not all days of the month, former smokers (n=100), who had been regular smokers but had quit, and never smokers (n=275), who had smoked 100 or fewer cigarettes in their lifetimes. Descriptive data on nicotine dependence, smoking
Discussion
Our results were generally consistent with previous research on the relations between depression vulnerability and smoking. As depression proneness or severity of worst lifetime depression symptoms increased, participants were more likely to have ever smoked, more likely to currently smoke, and more likely to report smoking as a way of reducing negative affect, though these results did not hold for smoking cessation, smoking rate, or severity of nicotine dependence. Contrary to our main
Acknowledgements
This article was based on the dissertation research of the first author. The research was supported by an Individual Research Training Award from the National Cancer Institute. Preparation of the article was supported by a doctoral dissertation fellowship from American University.
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She is now at the Department of Psychiatry of St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York.