Network state dynamics underpin basal craving in a transdiagnostic population.

Emerging fMRI methods quantifying brain dynamics present an opportunity to capture how fluctuations in brain responses give rise to individual variations in affective and motivation states. Although the experience and regulation of affective states affect psychopathology, their underlying time-varying brain responses remain unclear. Here, we present a novel framework to identify network states matched to an affective experience and examine how the dynamic engagement of these network states contributes to this experience.

Smartband-based smoking detection and real-time brief mindfulness intervention: findings from a feasibility clinical trial.

Background: Smartbands can be used to detect cigarette smoking and deliver real time smoking interventions. Brief mindfulness interventions have been found to reduce smoking.

Objective: This single arm feasibility trial used a smartband to detect smoking and deliver brief mindfulness exercises.

Behavioral Precursors of Nicotine Product Use Trajectories Among Youth.

Introduction: Preventing nicotine use among youth is a public health priority. Nicotine use emerges from complex relationships between numerous factors. This project used network analysis to model behavioral precursors of nicotine use (knowledge, attitudes, perceptions, intentions) among youth who had never used nicotine and determine which predicted future trajectories of use across multiple nicotine products.

Smartphone Apps Targeting Youth Tobacco Use Prevention and Cessation: An Assessment of Credibility and Quality.

Purpose Of Review: The goals of this study were to identify smartphone apps targeting youth tobacco use prevention and/or cessation discussed in the academic literature and/or available in the Apple App Store and to review and rate the credibility of the apps. We took a multiphase approach in a non-systematic review that involved conducting parallel literature and App Store searches, screening the returned literature and apps for inclusion, characterizing the studies and apps, and evaluating app quality using a standardized rating scale.

Recent Findings: The negative consequences of youth tobacco use initiation are profound and far-reaching.

Network state dynamics underpin craving in a transdiagnostic population.

Emerging fMRI brain dynamic methods present a unique opportunity to capture how brain region interactions across time give rise to evolving affective and motivational states. As the unfolding experience and regulation of affective states affect psychopathology and well-being, it is important to elucidate their underlying time-varying brain responses. Here, we developed a novel framework to identify network states specific to an affective state of interest and examine how their instantaneous engagement contributed to its experience.

Smartphone Apps for Smoking Cessation: Systematic Framework for App Review and Analysis.

Background: Cigarette smoking is a leading cause of preventable death, and identifying novel treatment approaches to promote smoking cessation is critical for improving public health. With the rise of digital health and mobile apps, these tools offer potential opportunities to address smoking cessation, yet the functionality of these apps and whether they offer scientifically based support for smoking cessation are unknown.

Objective: The goal of this research was to use the American Psychiatric Association app evaluation model to evaluate the top-returned apps from Android and Apple app store platforms related to smoking cessation and investigate the common app features available for end users.

A Network Investigation of Core Mindfulness Processes.

Objective: Mindfulness has been associated with improved psychological well-being and health, although outcomes from mindfulness-based interventions are mixed. One challenge is a limited understanding about which specific processes are core to mindfulness. Network analysis offers a method to characterize the core processes of mindfulness.

Transdiagnostic Connectome-Based Prediction of Craving.

Objective: Craving is a central construct in the study of motivation and human behavior and is also a clinical symptom of substance and non-substance-related addictive disorders. Thus, craving represents a target for transdiagnostic modeling.

Methods: The authors applied connectome-based predictive modeling (CPM) to functional connectivity data in a large (N=274) transdiagnostic sample of individuals with and without substance use-related conditions, to predict self-reported craving.

A Network Analysis of Cigarette Craving.

Introduction: Craving is considered a central process to addictive behavior including cigarette smoking, although the clinical utility of craving relies on how it is defined and measured. Network analysis enables examining the network structure of craving symptoms, identifying the most central symptoms of cigarette craving, and improving our understanding of craving and its measurement.

Aims And Methods: This study used network analysis to identify the central symptoms of self-reported cigarette craving as measured by the Craving Experience Questionnaire, which assesses both craving strength and craving frequency.

Models for Zero-Inflated and Overdispersed Correlated Count Data: An Application to Cigarette Use.

Introduction: Count outcomes in tobacco research are often analyzed with the Poisson distribution. However, they often exhibit features such as overdispersion (variance larger than expected) and zero inflation (extra zeros) that violate model assumptions. Furthermore, longitudinal studies have repeated measures that generate correlated counts.

E-cigarette Marketing Expenditures in the United States From 2016 to 2021: Targeted Media Outlets Geared Toward People Who Are at Increased Risk for Tobacco Use.

Introduction: E-cigarette advertising exposure is linked to e-cigarette initiation and use. Thus, monitoring trends in e-cigarette advertising practices is important to understand e-cigarette use patterns observed over recent years.

Aims And Methods: E-cigarette advertising expenditures (January 2016-July 2021; Numerator Ad Intel) for 154 U.

Smartband-Based Automatic Smoking Detection and Real-time Mindfulness Intervention: Protocol for a Feasibility Trial.

Background: Smoking is the leading cause of preventable death in the United States. Smoking cessation interventions delivered by smartphone apps are a promising tool for helping smokers quit. However, currently available smartphone apps for smoking cessation have not exploited their unique potential advantages to aid quitting.

Awareness, affect, and craving during smoking cessation: An experience sampling study.

Objective: Mindfulness has received attention in smoking cessation research, yet the mechanisms by which mindfulness may promote smoking cessation are not well understood. Mindfulness training may help individuals increase awareness and respond skillfully to processes that contribute to smoking, such as affective states and craving. This study used experience sampling (ES) to test how awareness was related to craving, positive and negative affect and smoking, in the moment, among smokers in treatment for smoking cessation.

Review of Popularity and Quality Standards of Opioid-Related Smartphone Apps.

Purpose Of Review: Opioid misuse, addiction, and related harm is a global crisis that affects public health and social and economic welfare. Many of the strategies being used to combat the opioid crisis could benefit from improved access and dissemination, such as that afforded by smartphone apps. The goal of this study was to characterize the purpose, audience, quality and popularity of opioid-related smartphone apps.

Effects of Smoking Status and State on Intrinsic Connectivity.

Background: Smoking behavior during the first 24 hours of a quit attempt is a significant predictor of longer-term abstinence, yet little is known about the neurobiology of early tobacco abstinence. Specifically, the effects of acute tobacco deprivation and reinstatement on brain function-particularly at the level of large-scale network dynamics and assessed across the entire brain-remain incompletely understood. To address this gap, this study used a mixed within- and between-subjects design to assess the effects of smoking status (yes/no smoker) and state (deprived vs.

Qualitative Evaluations of mHealth Interventions: Current Gaps and Future Directions.

Psycho-social factors are often addressed in behavioral health studies. While the purpose of many mHealth interventions is to facilitate behavior change, the focus is more prominently on the functionality and usability of the technology and less on the psycho-social factors that contribute to behavior change. Here we aim to identify the extent to which mHealth interventions for patient self- management address psychological factors.

Drinking and responses to antidrinking messages among young adults: An fMRI study.

Young adults consume most of their alcohol by binge drinking, and more than one-third report binge drinking in the past month. Some will transition out of excessive drinking, while others will maintain or increase alcohol use into adulthood. Public health campaigns depicting negative consequences of drinking have shown some efficacy at reducing this behavior.

Mobile Applications for the Treatment of Tobacco Use and Dependence.

Purpose Of Review: Smoking remains a leading preventable cause of premature death in the world; thus, developing effective and scalable smoking cessation interventions is crucial. This review uses the Obesity-Related Behavioral Intervention Trials (ORBIT) model for early phase development of behavioral interventions to conceptually organize the state of research of mobile applications (apps) for smoking cessation, briefly highlight their technical and theory-based components, and describe available data on efficacy and effectiveness.

Recent Findings: Our review suggests that there is a need for more programmatic efforts in the development of mobile applications for smoking cessation, though it is promising that more studies are reporting early phase research such as user-centered design.

Neurobiological Considerations for Tobacco Use Disorder.

Purpose Of Review: Neurobiological studies of tobacco/nicotine use examining genetic, molecular, functional, and behavioral correlates have improved our understanding of nicotine/tobacco dependence and have informed treatment. Recent work extending previously established findings and reporting novel methodologies and discoveries in preclinical and human studies are reviewed.

Recent Findings: Recent work in preclinical models has focused on the differential roles of nicotinic receptor subtypes and nicotine's effects on neural systems beyond cortico-striatal dopaminergic pathways, and utilizing advanced methodologies such as pharmacogenetics, optogenetics and rodent fMRI to identify targets for treatment.

Effects of the Psychedelic Amphetamine MDA (3,4-Methylenedioxyamphetamine) in Healthy Volunteers.

Entactogens such as 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, "molly", "ecstasy") appear to have unusual, potentially therapeutic, emotional effects. Understanding their mechanisms can benefit from clinical experiments with related drugs. Yet the first known drug with such properties, 3,4-Methylenedioxyamphetamine (MDA), remains poorly studied and its pharmacokinetics in humans are unknown.

Laterality of Poststroke Cortical Motor Activity during Action Observation Is Related to Hemispheric Dominance.

Background: Increased activity in the lesioned hemisphere has been related to improved poststroke motor recovery. However, the role of the dominant hemisphere-and its relationship to activity in the lesioned hemisphere-has not been widely explored.

Objective: Here, we examined whether the dominant hemisphere drives the lateralization of brain activity after stroke and whether this changes based on if the lesioned hemisphere is the dominant hemisphere or not.

Craving to Quit: A Randomized Controlled Trial of Smartphone App-Based Mindfulness Training for Smoking Cessation.

Introduction: Mindfulness training may reduce smoking rates and lessen the association between craving and smoking. This trial tested the efficacy of mindfulness training via smartphone app to reduce smoking. Experience sampling (ES) was used to measure real-time craving, smoking, and mindfulness.

A fMRI study on the impact of advertising for flavored e-cigarettes on susceptible young adults.

Background: E-cigarettes are sold in flavors such as "skittles," "strawberrylicious," and "juicy fruit," and no restrictions are in place on marketing e-cigarettes to youth. Sweets/fruits depicted in e-cigarette advertisements may increase their appeal to youth and interfere with health warnings. This study tested a brain biomarker of product preference for sweet/fruit versus tobacco flavor e-cigarettes, and whether advertising for flavors interfered with warning labels.