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Evaluating Distress Tolerance and Anxiety Sensitivity as Simultaneous and Concurrent Transdiagnostic Risk Factors for Smoking Quit Problems and Perceived Barriers for Cessation

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Abstract

Background

Although rates of cigarette smoking have declined in the United States (US), individuals experiencing affective vulnerabilities (e.g., anxiety, depression) have maintained high rates of smoking. Extant work has shown distress tolerance and anxiety sensitivity underpin both emotional disorders and smoking. Yet, limited work has evaluated the concurrent and simultaneous role of distress tolerance and anxiety sensitivity on smoking-related processes such as problems when attempting to quit smoking and perceived barriers for cessation.

Methods

Participants included 155 (Mage = 29.59 years; SD = 7.49; 69% male) adults seeking treatment for smoking cessation and low distress tolerance.

Results

Results indicated that only anxiety sensitivity was associated with problems when attempting to quit smoking. Distress tolerance and anxiety sensitivity were each associated with perceived barriers for cessation, with stronger relations for the impact of distress tolerance.

Conclusions

The current findings help elucidate the individual effects of distress tolerance and anxiety sensitivity in one overarching smoking model, thereby refining our understanding of these transdiagnostic factors in terms of clinically-relevant smoking processes.

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Data Availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Funding

Research reported in this publication was supported by a pre-doctoral National Research Service Award awarded from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to Dr. Brooke Redmond (F31-DA046127). This work was also supported by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to the University of Houston under Award Number U54MD015946. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, University of Houston, 3695 Cullen Boulevard, 126 Heyne Building, 77204, Houston, TX, USA

    Brooke Y. Redmond, Aniqua Salwa, Andre Bizier & Michael J. Zvolensky

  2. Department of Behavioral Science, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA

    Michael J. Zvolensky

  3. HEALTH Institute, University of Houston, Houston, TX, USA

    Michael J. Zvolensky

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  1. Brooke Y. Redmond
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  2. Aniqua Salwa
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  3. Andre Bizier
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  4. Michael J. Zvolensky
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Correspondence to Brooke Y. Redmond.

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Ethics Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the University of Houston (No. STUDY00000686).

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Redmond, B.Y., Salwa, A., Bizier, A. et al. Evaluating Distress Tolerance and Anxiety Sensitivity as Simultaneous and Concurrent Transdiagnostic Risk Factors for Smoking Quit Problems and Perceived Barriers for Cessation. Cogn Ther Res 47, 834–840 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10608-023-10401-9

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