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Modulation of the effects of amphetamine use on inhibitory control and error monitoring by smoking

Poster Session A - Saturday, March 7, 2026, 3:00 – 5:00 pm PST, Fairview/Kitsilano Ballrooms

Neil Muggleton¹ (neil.muggleton@gmail.com), Yu-Hua Liu², Chiao-Yun Chen²; ¹Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, National Central University, Taoyuan, Taiwan, ²Department of Criminology, National Chung Cheng University, Minhsiung, Chiayi, Taiwan

Methamphetamine is a widely used drug of abuse and while studies have looked at differences in cognition associated with its use, there are fewer studies looking at effects when it is used in conjunction with other substances of abuse. Here, differences in inhibitory control and error monitoring were investigated in recently abstinent amphetamine users with no other drug use (non-smoking methamphetamine users, NSA), amphetamine users who also smoked (i.e., nicotine users, smoking methamphetamine users, SA), and non-smoking control participants (NSC) using an image (drug-use related or neutral) cued stop-signal task with concurrent electroencephalographic recording. Both SA and NSA groups performed worse than NSC group but only the NSA group showed significantly worse inhibitory control. For the SA group, correlation analyses showed a negative relationship between smoking frequency and both the N2 event-related potential (ERP) component amplitude and SSRT, supporting a link between smoking behavior and improved inhibitory control. For error-related effects, the SA group showed enhanced Pe ERP responses with drug-related cues, suggesting greater error awareness in high-risk contexts. Overall, the SA group showed better inhibitory control and error monitoring than the NSA group, suggesting that smoking may moderate some cognitive deficits associated with amphetamine use. These findings highlight the importance of the overall pattern of substance use when investigating the effects of amphetamine use specifically, and drug use more generally. This is particularly important given the frequent suggestion of links between drug use/addiction and inhibitory control ability.

Topic Area: EXECUTIVE PROCESSES: Monitoring & inhibitory control