Perinatal nicotine exposure relates to stimulus-locked event-related potentials in early adolescence during an emotional go/no-go task.

Nicotine exposure is associated with negative consequences on the developing brain, both in utero and after birth. We investigated the relationship between perinatal nicotine exposure and electroencephalographic brain activity recorded during an emotional faces Go/No-Go task among adolescents. Seventy-one adolescents aged 12-15 years completed a Go/No-Go task using fearful and happy faces. Parents completed questionnaire measures of their child's temperament and self-regulation and retrospectively reported on nicotine exposure during the perinatal period. Perinatally exposed children (n = 20) showed increased and prolonged frontal event-related potential (ERP) differentiation in stimulus-locked analyses; that is, greater emotion and condition differentiation in comparison with their non-exposed peers (n = 51). However, non-exposed children showed greater late emotion differentiation recorded over posterior sites. Response-locked ERP differences were not found. ERP effects were not related to temperamental, self-regulatory, or parental education and income-related factors. This study is the first to demonstrate a relationship between perinatal nicotine exposure and ERPs in an emotional Go/No-Go task among adolescents. Findings suggest that while conflict detection remains intact for adolescents with perinatal nicotine exposure, their attentional allocation to behaviourally relevant stimuli may be magnified to beyond optimal levels, particularly when emotion is salient in information processing. Future studies can extend these findings by isolating prenatal nicotine exposure and comparing its effects to isolated postnatal exposure and clarifying the implications of the face and performance processing differences in adolescence.

The Role of Hypermasculinity, Token Resistance, Rape Myth, and Assertive Sexual Consent Communication Among College Men.

PURPOSE: A greater understanding of how college men's gendered beliefs and communication styles relate to their sexual consent attitudes and intentions is essential within the shifting context of negative to affirmative consent policies on college campuses. The results of this study can be used to help design more effective sexual consent interventions. METHODS: Three hundred seventy undergraduate college men completed cross-sectional online surveys. Hierarchical multiple regression examined how hypermasculinity, token resistance, rape myth acceptance, and sexual communication assertiveness were associated with consent-related attitudes, intentions, and interpretations. RESULTS: Bivariate correlations among all variables were significant. In multivariate analyses, sexual communication assertiveness was positively associated with all consent outcomes, and token resistance and rape myth acceptance were negatively associated with some. Hypermasculinity was not a significant factor. CONCLUSIONS: Programs seeking to improve sexual consent communication among college men should reduce destructive beliefs and encourage sexually assertive communication.