Abstinence effects in adolescent smokers selleck kinase inhibitor may differ from those measured in adults based on characteristic differences in smoking intensity, chronicity, neurodevelopment, and dependence severity. Recent studies on adolescent smoking abstinence effects provide support for negative reinforcement models of smoking maintenance and progression. Experimental studies by Colby et al. (2010) and Jacobsen et al. (2005), Jacobsen, Pugh, Constable, Westerveld, and Mencl (2007), and Jacobsen, Slotkin, Westerveld, Mencl, and Pugh (2006) found that adolescent daily smokers experience robust increases in negative affect, withdrawal symptoms, and smoking urges after acute (12�C24hr) smoking abstinence. Further support is provided by studies that have demonstrated dramatic reductions in aversive symptoms during smoking reinstatement among adolescent daily smokers (Colby et al.

, 2010; Corrigall, Zack, Eissenberg, Belsito, & Scher, 2001; Zack, Belsito, Scher, Eissenberg, & Corrigall, 2001). Studies on the effects of abstinence on positive affect in adolescent smokers have been more limited. The only study to evaluate the effects of smoking abstinence and reinstatement on positive affect in adolescent smokers (Colby et al., 2010) found no significant effects, in contrast to studies with adult smokers which found that abstinence reduces positive affect (al��Absi, Hatsukami, & Davis, 2005; al��Absi, Hatsukami, Davis, & Wittmers, 2004; Leventhal, Waters, Moolchan, Heishman, & Pickworth, 2010). These results with adolescents require replication, but may point to differences in smoking determinants between adolescent and adult smokers.

Although these findings show that adolescent smokers experience abstinence effects on key measures, they also tentatively suggest that the phenomenology of smoking abstinence may differ in adolescent versus adult smokers. In this context, examining a broader range of abstinence effects in adolescent smokers may improve understanding of these potential differences. For example, GSK-3 studies in adult smokers have found that overnight abstinence increases reactivity to irritable stimuli (i.e., reactive irritability; Acri & Grunberg, 1992) and smoking-related cues (i.e., cue reactivity; Sayette, Martin, Wertz, Shiffman, & Perrott, 2001; Watson, Carpenter, Saladin, Gray, & Upadhyaya, 2010), yet, the influence of abstinence on these measures in adolescent smokers has not been tested. In addition, the question of how individual differences in baseline smoking characteristics predict the severity of abstinence effects is an important issue that has received little prior attention in adolescents.