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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2014 Oct 15.
Published in final edited form as: Biochem Pharmacol. 2013 Aug 8;86(8):10.1016/j.bcp.2013.07.032. doi: 10.1016/j.bcp.2013.07.032

Figure 2.

Figure 2

Model for how nicotinic stimulation may improve cognitive and mood symptoms in late-life depression: Stimulation of neuronal nicotinic receptors improves cognition by increasing task-relevant and decreasing off-task neural activation. Frontally-mediated attention and cognitive control networks will increase in activity or efficiency and the ruminative, default mode network will decrease in activation while individuals are on-task. Greater task-oriented processing will lead to improved attention, response inhibition, and processing speed, which will contribute to improved executive functioning. The cognitive components of the mood dysfunction in depression will also receive benefit from nicotinic stimulation, directly resulting from more efficient neural activation patterns and downstream from improved executive functioning. With less severe bias and reactivity to negative stimuli and decreased maladaptive rumination, antidepressant and/or psychotherapeutic treatment will be more effective in relieving mood symptoms of depression.