Dopamine receptor (DRD2) genotype‐dependent effects of nicotine on attention and distraction during rapid visual information processing

Abstract

The effects of nicotine, distractor type, and dopamine type-2 receptor (DRD2) genotype on rapid visual information processing (RVIP) task performance were assessed in habitual smokers. Four RVIP tasks differed in terms of distractor location (central vs. peripheral) and distractor type (numeric vs. emotional). Each participant performed each of the tasks on two different days, once while wearing an active nicotine patch and once while wearing a placebo patch. Overall, the nicotine patch produced more accurate detection of and faster reaction times to target sequences; however, these effects varied with distractor type and genotype. Nicotine speeded reaction time more with left-visual-field (LVF) than right-visual-field (RVF) emotional distractors but speeded reaction time more with RVF than LVF numeric distractors, especially when the distractor digit matched the target sequence in terms of numeric oddness or evenness. Nicotine tended to facilitate performance more in individuals with at least one A1 allele than in homozygous A2A2 individuals, especially with numeric distractors presented to the left hemisphere. Nicotine tended to reduce distraction by negative stimuli more than other types of stimuli. Few gender differences were observed. The overall pattern of results was consistent with the view that nicotine modulates selective attention or subsequent information processing in a manner that depends partly on the emotional versus numeric nature of task distractors, DRD2 genotype, and the brain hemisphere that initially processes the distractors (visual field of distractor).