nicotine dependence severity and revised reinforcement sensitivity theory: assessing the mediating role of risky decision making using path analysis

Background: gray’s revised reinforcement sensitivity theory (rrst) is a neuropsychologicalexplanation of personality that has been broadly used in substance use disorders. although thebehavioral approach system (bas) is strongly related to nicotine dependence, findings inbehavioral inhibition system (bis) are controversial and there is little information about therole of the fight/flight/freeze system (fffs) in nicotine dependence. the purpose of thepresent study was to evaluate the mediating role of risky decision making (rdm) in thisrelationship to clarify the controversy and fill the gap.methods: the final sample of this correlation study comprised of 347 university students (age,mean±sd 23.2±6.7) who completed two selfreport measures, including the fagerstrom testfor nicotine dependence (ftnd), jackson5 questionnaire of rrst, and a computerizediowa gambling task (igt) to measure rdm. pearson correlation and a path analysisframework were used to determine the simple, direct, and indirect effects of rrst systems onnicotine dependence severity through rdm.results: using amos, path analyses demonstrated significant direct and indirect effects ofbas and fffs/bis on tobacco use. also, the relationship between bas/fffs/bis andtobacco use was shown to be mediated by rdm.conclusion: it was demonstrated that the relationship among bas /fffs/bis and tobaccouse can be partly explained using maladaptive rdm strategies, suggesting that decreasingreliance on decisionmaking in risky situations, while increasing the use of decisionmakingskills educations in risky situations, and increasing the use of alternative sensation and funseeking by smoking and emotion regulation and mindfulnessbased therapies