Nicotine And Cognitive Effects

Early studies on the cognitive effects of nicotine were limited by inadequacies in test selection and experimental design. Even when these were overcome, the confounding influence of tobacco abstinence still limited the conclusions which could be drawn. However, recent controlled studies among smokers and non-smokers has shown that nicotine has small, but reproducible, specific positive effects on human cognition and psychomotor performance which cannot be simply attributed to a recovery from tobacco abstinence.