Cognitive flexibility is associated with KIBRA variant and modulated by recent tobacco use

The kidney and brain expressed protein gene (KIBRA) and the calsyntenin 2 gene (CLSTN2) are reportedly involved in synaptic plasticity. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) rs17070145 (KIBRA) and rs6439886 (CLSTN2) have been found to affect memory performance measures. This study examined the association of KIBRA SNP rs17070145 and CLSTN2 SNPs rs6439886 and rs17348572 (a nonsynonymous variant) with cognitive flexibility in 674 African Americans (AAs; 526 current smokers) and 419 European Americans (EAs; 318 current smokers). The subjects' cognitive flexibility was assessed using the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test. The effects on cognitive flexibility of sex, age, education, and tobacco recency (a possible mediator of gene effects in smokers), the three SNPs, and the interaction of each SNP with tobacco recency were analyzed using multivariate analysis of variance. In AAs, there were no main or interaction effects of the SNPs on cognitive flexibility. In EAs, the two CLSTN2 SNPs showed no main effect on cognitive flexibility. However, among EAs, individuals with the KIBRA rs17070145 T allele made significantly more perseverative responses (P=0.002) and perseverative errors (P=0.002) than those with no T allele. Furthermore, among EAs with the rs17070145 T allele, current smokers made significantly fewer perseverative responses (P<0.001) and perseverative errors (P<0.001) than past smokers. Nongenetic factors (age, education, and tobacco recency) had substantial effects on cognitive flexibility in both AAs and EAs. We conclude that variation in KIBRA influences cognitive flexibility in a population-specific way, and that current smoking status moderates this effect.