Cigarette Smoking and the Body essays

Cigarette Smoking and the Body essays Tobacco is consumed worldwide everyday by millions of people. Many people cannot prevent themselves from smoking because tobacco contains a drug called nicotine that makes them feel as if they need it in order to function normally. Nicotine is a substance found in tobacco. It is found in all tobacco products such as: cigarettes, pipe tobacco, chewing tobacco, and cigars. When a person smokes a tobacco product, they inhale the smoke, which contains nicotine as well as over 500 chemicals, including formaldehyde (used to preserve dead bodies), cyanide, insecticide, carbon monoxide and tar [1]. I personally think that smoking is detrimental and that it has many fatal side effects, but eventhough many people know of these effects, they still chose to smoke. For what reason? Nicotine has a few positive effects on the body. It stimulates memory and alertness, enhancing cognitive skills that require speed, reaction time, vigilance, and work performance. It acts as a mood-altering agent, it tends to alleviate boredom and reduce stress, and reduces aggressive responses to stressful events. It also tends to be an appetite suppressant, specifically decreasing the appetite for simple carbohydrates (sweets) and inhibiting the efficiency with which food is metabolised. People who use tobacco products frequently depend upon it providing these side effects to help them accomplish certain tasks at specific levels of performance. Many people start smoking for the reasons mentioned before but some also smoke primarily because of peer pressure and advertising. Some also start to smoke because they think it makes them look cool. These 'positive' effects may seem reason enough for you to smoke but the negative effects are much greater and detrimental. The immediate affects of nicotine on the body include: increase in blood pressure, increase in heart rate, thickening of blood, narrowing of arteries, decrease in skin temperature, increase in resp...