Scientists break down the astonishing impact smoking weed as a teenager has on your brain
Warning: This article contains discussion of drug addiction, which some readers may find distressing.
Scientists have revealed just what the Devil’s Lettuce does to young brains, and it’s shocking.
Weed, cannabis, Mary Jane… whatever else you choose to call marijuana, these are all different terms for the same illegal drug that has been prohibited for use and purchase under the federal Controlled Substances Act in many states.
However, that hadn’t stopped teens from using it illegally or medically via dispensaries around the US.
Illinois and Pennsylvania are just two states that allow minors to use certain forms of weed for medical use as long as they meet the criteria.
But with smoking or consuming a substance that alters your state of being and consciousness, surely it’s got to affect your brain health later in life?
Is smoking weed bad for your brain? A study in Denmark has spent 44 years trying to find this out (juanma hache/ Getty Stock)
Correct, but maybe not as you thought it would.
According to research published in the National Library of Medicine, the effects aren’t actually negative.
A group of scientists who studied marijuana use and its potential connection to age‐related cognitive decline from early adulthood to late midlife, found that there is no ‘significant harmful effects of cannabis use on age‐related cognitive decline’.
They determined this after following 5,162 Danish men who were born between 1949 and 1961 for 44 years.
39.9 percent of the participants admitted to having used weed at least once, while 51.1 percent of that smaller group claimed to have started smoking weed before turning 18.
Having tracked their IQ over the decades, they found that those who smoked weed as teenagers were no worse off cognitively than those who didn’t smoke it at all.
It showed no cognitive decline (Nadzeya Haroshka/ Getty Stock)
The study added: “The estimated difference in cognitive decline between cannabis users and nonusers was modest and may not hold clinical significance.
“Among cannabis users, no significant associations with age‐related cognitive decline could be demonstrated for age of initiation of cannabis use. Years of frequent cannabis use were generally associated with no significant difference in cognitive decline when compared with no frequent use.”
However, the researchers do want to break down the study for women in the future, too, meaning we’ll have to wait and see what those results bring.
So, there you have it. There is really no difference between a weed-smoker brain and any other brain.
But that doesn’t mean you should go out and do it…
