Trust and smooking

The main causes of death in the world, in Europe and in Italy are linked to cardiovascular diseases and tumors. Yet, a significant fraction of the population (in Italy about 20%, more than 10 million people!) is addicted to smooking, with detrimental effects on health and major outcomes exactly in the form of cardiovascular diseases and tumors (for more details see the dedicated section of the italian Ministry of Health, from which the main image of this post was taken).

It is difficult to explain this phenomenon as a desire for suicide.

The phenomenon, however, can be explained very well if we consider that our decisions and behaviors are linked to the complex interaction between endocrine and nervous systems.

The neuroendocrine system

The nervous system — which provides us with self-awareness and underlies our mind — is a complex communication network based on the exchange of bioelectrical signals. The endocrine system, on the other hand, is a complex network of chemical communications, mediated by hormones. The two systems are deeply intertwined and influence each other, determining our interpretations and behavior in an automatic and implicit way. There is an entire branch of biology that studies the interaction between the nervous system and the endocrine system, called neuroendocrinology.

Hormones

Hormones are produced by the cells of our organism (glands or endocrine cells) and may trigger a cascade of responses to regulate the functioning of our body, in the same cell, in nearby or distant cells (for example through blood circulation). Hormone receptors may generate signals at various abstraction levels, as well as stimulate the production of other hormones. For example, ghrelin is the hormone that stimulates the sense of appetite, while leptin regulates the sense of satiety. Sensations of (intense) pleasure are regulated by hormones such as dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and endorphins, and for this reason they are often referred to as feel-good hormones. On the other hand, sensations of discomfort and stress (as well as pathologies such as depression) are associated with an excess of particular hormones such as cortisol, adrenaline and noradrenaline, generally useful for increasing the body’s reactivity and vigilance in challenging or dangerous contexts.

However, it is difficult (if not impossible) to associate a single function with each hormone. Hormons are involved in almost every activity of our organism, such as development and growth, metabolism, homeostasis (control of vital functions such as breathing, heartbeat, body temperature), reproduction.

Now let’s come back to smoking

Nicotine contained in tobacco stimulates the release of hormones such as dopamine and serotonin associated with a sensation of pleasure, triggering discomfort in absence (therefore causing strong addiction). Pleasure may be also associated to social mechanisms — and therefore linked to the interpretation of our mind, that is, our nervous system — (for example, being part of a group of smokers or friendship with a smoker).

In order to experience pleasure and/or escape discomfort, people overlook the enormous health risks to which they expose themselves, unreasonably and disproportionately increasing their confidence in the fact that those risks will not affect them.

Internal pleasure effectively overrides any other adverse signal which comes from the outside (which requires interpretation by the nervous system), such as the increasingly widespread statistics on the deleterious effects of smoking, the fact that it damages the health of people nearby, the increasingly higher costs of cigarettes, the unpleasant smell of smoke on clothes, in the house or in the car. This process takes place implicitly inside smookers — they are not truly aware of it.

This relevant example more generally teaches us that the interpretation of events, and in particular the evaluation of trust, is affected in a decisive and implicit way by our sensations, which at a lower abstraction level are linked to the complex interaction between the endocrine and nervous system.

The angels

Now, what the hell “The Angels” have to do with this article? Well, nothing, apart from the title of a beautiful song by Vasco Rossi (with music by Tullio Ferro and an outstanding guitar solo starting at 4:05 by Michael Landau), which is precisely inherent to the dramatic outcomes of smoking.

Apparently, Vasco wrote it in memory of Maurizio Lolli, a great friend and his first manager — a big smoker — who passed away in 1994 at the age of 43 due to lung cancer. Here is a rather self-explanatory excerpt from the (translated) lyrics:

If you really have stopped smoking after reading this article and listening to Michael Landau’s intense solo (which every time strikes me with a strong rush of adrenaline and pleasure, a hymn to life I would say— perhaps and above all because I also am a guitarist), your nervous system “regulated” your endocrine system, which was addicted to nicotine. Please let me know, it would be very important for me (but indeed — much more important to you)!