The Effect of Nicotine on Arousal, Cognition and Social Cognition in Young and Elderly Healthy Subjects.

This is a double-blind (neither physician nor subject knows the name of the assigned drug), placebo-controlled, randomized (study drug assigned by chance), three-way-crossover trial (participants may receive different interventions sequentially during the trial) in young and elderly healthy volunteers. The three-way-crossover treatment phase will consist of three blinded treatment periods separated by a wash out period (the period allowed for the entire administered drug to be eliminated from the body) of 2 to 7 days. The study duration for each volunteer will be approximately 8 weeks. Each volunteer enrolled will be randomized to receive Treatment A (1mg nicotine per dosing), Treatment B (2mg nicotine per dosing) or Treatment C (placebo) during one of their treatment period. The study drug (nicotine or placebo) will be administered three times daily on Day 1 of each treatment phase as a mouth spray, separated 2 to 3 hours from each other (i.e. 0h; and 2 to 3h; and 4 to 6h post first dosing). Three different blocks of cognitive assessments will follow, one after each drug administration. Safety evaluations include adverse event monitoring, vital signs and clinical laboratory tests. Each volunteer participating will receive 3 identical study drug administrations per dosing day (2 to 3 hours from each other), resulting in an overall dose of 3 mg nicotine (Treatment A), 6 mg nicotine (Treatment B) or 0 mg nicotine (Treatment C) per dosing day. By the end of the study, after the 3-way crossover, each volunteer will have received 9 mg nicotine via mouth spray.