Every January, the same pattern repeats itself across Cambridge. Students decide they are finally quitting smoking or vaping. Disposables are thrown away, apps are downloaded, promises are made. And by February, many have quietly relapsed. By then, the term ‘new year’s resolution’ has lost its meaning.

This cycle is usually framed as a failure of discipline. But the science tells a different story. Quitting nicotine is not simply about motivation or self-control. Instead, it is about reversing changes in the brain that have made nicotine become necessary for emotional stability, concentration, and stress regulation.

Nicotine works rapidly. When inhaled, it reaches the brain within seconds and activates nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. This triggers dopamine release in the mesolimbic reward system: the circuitry involved in reinforcement learning and motivation. With repeated use, the brain adapts. Dopamine receptors are downregulated, baseline reward sensitivity drops, and nicotine shifts from feeling pleasurable to becoming stabilising – something the brain relies on to maintain normal functioning rather than a source of occasional enjoyment.

“Nicotine shifts from feeling pleasurable to becoming stabilising – something the brain relies on to maintain normal function”

This is precisely why withdrawal feels so disruptive. When nicotine intake stops, dopamine signalling temporarily collapses, producing irritability, anxiety, low mood, impaired concentration, and heightened stress reactivity. These effects are not anecdotal. In fact, they are consistently documented in laboratory and clinical studies, and typically peak during the first few weeks of abstinence. If quitting is your new year’s resolution, this could coincide exactly with the start of term, when you’re needing to perform at your best academically. Asking someone to quit nicotine during term, therefore, is asking them to accept a temporary cognitive disadvantage. Reduced attentional control and increased emotional volatility are not signs of weakness. Indeed, they are predictable neurobiological consequences of withdrawal.

Vaping has made this problem harder to recognise. While cigarettes deliver nicotine intermittently, many modern e-cigarettes provide high, stable doses with minimal effort. A 2023 review in the British Journal of General Practice found that nicotine dependence was up to twice as high in e-cigarette users compared with conventional cigarette smokers, with flavours playing a major role in sustaining use. Alarmingly, around 20% of young vapers later transition to smoking, and three-quarters report dual use, undermining the idea that vaping is a harmless or temporary substitute.

Because vaping is discreet and socially embedded, nicotine use can become continuous rather than episodic. A qualitative study of adolescents published in Substance Abuse: Research and Treatment found that vaping quickly becomes routinised – paired with studying, gaming, getting ready for school, and managing anxiety. Participants described vaping not as a thrill, but as “something to do” and something that helped them cope with stress. Many wanted to quit, but relied almost entirely on willpower and distraction, with little awareness of effective cessation strategies.

“Quitting is no longer about resisting a craving. Instead, it feels like losing a tool for thinking”

Behavioural psychology helps explain why this matters. Nicotine does not just reinforce pleasure. Instead, it enhances attentional salience. Over time, the brain learns to associate nicotine with focus, productivity, and emotional regulation. For students in the trenches of Week 5, this pairing often forms around revision sessions, essay deadlines, and late-night work. Nicotine becomes cognitively functional – it adopts the role of an energy drink, a mid-study ‘pick-me-up’. When that association is broken, the loss feels disproportionate. Quitting is no longer about resisting a craving. Instead, it feels like losing a tool for thinking. This helps explain why relapse rates are highest under stress and why motivation alone is a poor predictor of long-term success.

Recent evidence suggests that vaping may also intersect with mental health in ways that make quitting harder. A 2025 study in Scientific Reports found significant associations between e-cigarette use and anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress symptoms, and ADHD among undergraduate health sciences students. While causality remains complex, the pattern is clear: nicotine use often co-exists with psychological distress, and for many students, vaping functions as a coping mechanism.

This is where language like ‘willpower’ becomes actively harmful. When relapse is interpreted as moral failure, students are less likely to seek effective support and more likely to attempt repeated unsupported quit attempts – a pattern associated with worse outcomes. By contrast, large cohort studies consistently show that pharmacological aids such as nicotine replacement therapy or varenicline significantly increase quit success by stabilising neurochemical disruption during withdrawal.

Behavioural scaffolding matters too. Successful cessation often involves restructuring routines, altering cues, and reducing exposure during high-risk periods: strategies drawn from habit-formation research rather than self-control rhetoric. In other words, quitting works best when the environment is redesigned to support it, not when individuals are told to simply try harder.

“When relapse is interpreted as moral failure, students are less likely to seek effective support”

What might this redesign actually look like?

At a student level, it means recognising that nicotine often functions as a social and emotional regulator, not just a stimulant. A 2025 study by the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco showed that vaping is frequently embedded in shared routines – revision breaks, social bonding, stress relief – and that quitting can feel like withdrawing from a community as much as from a substance. Replacing nicotine therefore requires replacing the functions it serves: structured breaks that are truly restorative, involving alternative anxiolytic strategies such as brief physical activity or guided breathing, and social norms that do not implicitly tie focus, productivity, or stress relief to chemical stimulation.

At an institutional level, universities could do more to align cessation support with academic pressure points. This might include proactive access to nicotine replacement during Easter exam periods, clearer signposting of evidence-based quitting support through college welfare systems, and messaging that treats relapse as a predictable neurobiological hurdle, rather than personal or moral failure. Designing environments that reduce stress load – rather than moralising it – makes quitting more realistic, not less.

Quitting nicotine is difficult not because students lack character, but because nicotine reshapes the brain systems that character relies on. Replacing shame with understanding does not excuse addiction; it makes recovery more likely. If we want fewer quiet relapses each January, we need to stop confusing willpower with biology. Instead, we must start designing environments that make quitting genuinely possible.