Quitting Smoking – Psychological Effects of Smoking

Don’t let the psychological effects of smoking get in the way of your success. Dealing with the psychological effects will improve your chances of quitting smoking long-term.

The physiological and psychological effects of smoking provides many positive reinforcements that makes smoking quickly become a habit – one that is hard to break. As a person continues to smoke they develop a tolerance and become accustom to having a certain level of nicotine in his or her body. In fact, research studies have shown that (without realizing it) smokers regulate the number of cigarettes they smoke in order to maintain their own personally preferred level of nicotine. For example, smokers who are given a very high nicotine cigarette will puff less often than usual, so they don’t take in more nicotine than their preferred amount. Likewise, with a low nicotine cigarette, the smoker will take more puffs than usual, in order to get that preferred amount of nicotine.

When a person cuts back on smoking or quits all together they experience nicotine withdrawal and they can become irritable, depressed, lack of concentration, etc. Suffering from the withdrawal effects are a sign of physical dependence on nicotine. Physicians define physical dependence as a change in the body’s functioning that is produced by repeated administration of a drug (in this case nicotine), such that continued use of the drug is needed to prevent withdrawal symptoms.

For some, dealing with the physical addiction is far easier than the psychological effects of smoking. Once the habit of smoking takes hold a smoker has to continue to smoke in order to feel “normal”. In other words, the effects produced by nicotine and the behaviors associated with smoking create a condition of psychological dependence that can be very difficult to break in the future.

Psychological Effects of Smoking

Overcoming the psychological effects of smoking can be difficult. In fact, for many smokers this is the primary cause of failure to quit smoking long-term. Quitting smoking is a life changing decision and the way you think about smoking will play a large role in your happiness and success after quitting. Many quitting smoking products revolve around the physical dependence and do very little to address the psychological, if steps aren’t taken to change the way you think and feel about smoking it will be very difficult to quit. Breaking a physical addiction, habit, is much easier than conquering the mental. It doesn’t take expensive programs or drugs to undo the psychological effects of smoking, just an open mind and the will to quit.

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