How do chemicals in tobacco?
The nicotine in cigarette smoke causes an addiction to smoking. Nicotine is an addictive drug just like heroin and cocaine: When taken in small amounts, nicotine creates pleasant feelings that make the smoker want to smoke more. It acts on the chemistry of the brain and central nervous system, affecting the smoker’s mood. Nicotine works very much like other addicting drugs, by flooding the brain’s reward circuits with dopamine (a chemical messenger). Nicotine also gives you a little bit of adrenaline — not enough to notice, but enough to speed up your heart and raise your blood pressure. Nicotine reaches the brain within seconds after taking a puff, but its effects start to wear off within a few minutes. This often leads the smoker to get another cigarette. If the smoker doesn’t smoke again soon, withdrawal symptoms kick in and get worse over time. The typical smoker takes about 10 puffs from each cigarette. A person smoking a pack per day gets about 200 “hits” of nicotine each day. S
