Behavioral Economic Demand for Alcohol and Cigarettes in Heavy Drinking Smokers: Evidence of Asymmetric Cross-commodity Reinforcing Value

Introduction: Previous studies have highlighted a strong bidirectional relationship between cigarette and alcohol consumption. To advance our understanding of this relationship the present study uses a behavioral economic approach in a community sample (N = 383) of nontreatment seeking heavy drinking smokers. Aims and Methods: The aims were to examine same-substance and cross-substance relationships between alcohol and cigarette use, and latent factors of demand. A community sample of nontreatment seeking heavy drinking smokers completed an in-person assessment battery including measures of alcohol and tobacco use as well as the Cigarette Purchase Task and the Alcohol Purchase Task. Latent factors of demand were derived from these hypothetical purchase tasks. Results: Results revealed a positive correlation between paired alcohol and cigarette demand indices (eg, correlation between alcohol intensity and cigarette intensity) (rs = 0.18-0.46, p <= .003). Over and above alcohol factors, cigarette use variables (eg, Fagerstrom Test for Nicotine Dependence and cigarettes per smoking day) significantly predicted an additional 4.5% (p < .01) of the variance in Persistence values but not Amplitude values for alcohol. Over and above cigarette factors, alcohol use variables predicted cigarette Persistence values (Delta R-2 = .013, p = .05), however, did not predict Amplitude values. Conclusions: These results advance our understanding of the overlap between cigarette and alcohol by demonstrating that involvement with one substance was associated with demand for the other substance. This asymmetric profile-from smoking to alcohol demand, but not vice versa-suggests that it is not simply tapping into a generally higher reward sensitivity and warrants further investigation.