Effects of cigarette smoking history on cognitive functioning in healthy older adults

The authors assessed the unique effect of smoking history on cognitive functioning after adjusting for demographic factors such as age, education, and gender, and presence of vascular illness.

A sample of 127 healthy older adults (29 men, 98 women) between the ages of 47 and 83 (mean: 66.9) were administered a comprehensive neuropsychological battery. Information regarding risk for vascular illness was assessed with a detailed self-report history and/or medical examination. Smoking history was gathered with a self-report questionnaire, and a composite score reflecting amount and duration of cigarette use was computed. From this composite score, three smoking groups were created: None-Light, Moderate, and Heavy smokers.

Analyses of covariance, using age, education, gender, and vascular status as the covariates, revealed that the heavy smokers performed significantly poorer than the other groups on two scores from a test assessing executive function/problem-solving (Wisconsin Card-Sorting Test), but not on any of the other cognitive tests.

Consistent with previous findings, smoking history did not appear to have deleterious effects on most cognitive domains. Heavy smoking history, however, did appear to affect performance on a measure of executive functioning.