[Clinical psychopharmacology of Ginkgo biloba extract]. / Psycho-pharmacologie clinique de l'extrait de Ginkgo biloba.

From this general review of the pharmacological, psychopharmacological and clinical studies performed with Ginkgo biloba extract, the following conclusions can be drawn: the drug seems to be effective in patients with vascular disorders, in all types of dementia and even in patients suffering from cognitive disorders secondary to depression, because of its beneficial effects on mood. Of special concern are people who are just beginning to experience deterioration in their cognitive function. Ginkgo biloba extract might delay deterioration and enable these subject to maintain a normal life and escape institutionalization. In addition, Ginkgo biloba extract appears to be a safe drug, being well tolerated, even in doses many times higher than those usually recommended.

Facilitation of learning and state dependency with nicotine.

Two studies of nicotine and memory encoding were carried out using a state-dependent design. The first experiment used cigarettes and involved memory for stimuli that could not be encoded phonemically or semantically. The results of this recognition study show that nicotine was facilitating the input of non-phonemicably encodable and non-semanticably encodable information to storage and that nicotine produced state-dependent learning. The second study used nicotine tablets and involved memory for concrete words. The results of the free recall study show that nicotine produced state-dependent learning, that nicotine was facilitating the input of information to storage, but there was no evidence that associative processes had been changed by nicotine. These findings give no support for the suggestion that a cholinergic system in the brain is controlling the encoding of intrinsic cues relating to phonemic and semantic properties of things but not those involving mnemonic encoding by mental imagery, but rather that the cholinergic system is non-specifically involved in encoding.

Smoking as a coping strategy.

People in modern society use an ever increasing variety of psychoactive substances to help them cope with the increasing amount of stress they experience in the course of their lives. A survey was undertaken to investigate the role of smoking as a coping strategy and the relationship between smoking, the other coping strategies available, and personality in an undergraduate student population. There seemed to be three distinct subgroups in this population as defined by their preferred coping strategy: those who seek help from their friends when faced by problems, those who seek "expert advice," and those who attempt to solve their problems alone; often with the use of drugs. Those falling in the third category, that of self-help, were more likely to self-medicate with a wide variety of psychoactive substances. If they were smokers then they smoked more cigarettes and chose their brand on the basis of strength of a cigarette. There was no evidence for different personality types tending to smoke in different situations and no evidence for any link between extraversion or neuroticism and substance use or coping.