Behavior: Marijuana and a Slower Mind and Body

SmokeyMacPot

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Long-term heavy users of marijuana perform significantly worse on tests of mental agility and physical dexterity than short-term users or nonusers, even when they have abstained from smoking for more than 24 hours, new research shows.

Scientists, led by Lambros Messinis, a neuropsychologist at University Hospital in Petras, Greece, tested three groups.

They were 20 long-term users who had smoked four or more marijuana cigarettes a week for at least 10 years, 20 short-term users who had smoked a similar amount for 5 to 10 years and, finally, 24 people, representing a control group, who had used marijuana no more than 20 times in their lives and not in the prior two years.

The long- and short-term users were drawn from participants in a drug rehabilitation program.

Even after controlling for I.Q., other drug use, age, sex, depression and other variables, long-term users scored significantly lower than control group members and shorter-term users on tests of verbal fluency, memory and coordination.

The exercises included naming objects when shown pictures of them, thinking up words with the same initial letter, listening to lists of words and later recalling them and drawing lines in the proper order among numbers and letters randomly spread on paper.

The study appears in the March issue of Neurology.

Dr. Messinis acknowledged that the results might have differed with marijuana users from the general population. Still, he said, the study was carefully controlled, and frequent heavy use appeared to have significant negative effects on performance.

Source: New York Times (NY)
Author: Nicholas Bakalar
Published: March 21, 2006
Copyright: 2006 The New York Times Co.
Contact: letters@nytimes.com
Website: The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia
 
I can't believe how many news stories are coming from this single study! God damn journalists will print anything as long as its controversial, even if its validity is severely lacking.
 
but damn makes ya think
 
Interesting how much of the "media" just regurgitate the news off of the AP wire without examining it, thinking about it or even questioning it.

If the AP wire published a piece stating that Broccoli was a serious health hazard and should be banned, I'm not sure any journalist in the US would question it. And it would get repeated everywhere. :hmmmm:

Question is: Who controls the AP wire???
 
There are so many variables that you shouldn't be able to even call that a study.

What were the "scores" even? How did they score them? And if they were in drug rehab you think they've probaly done more than just toke up for the past 10 years. I read about a study showing that tobacco lowers your IQ too. And if thats true, why don't they seperate those groups too?

I hate stupid articles like this designed to make marijuana users look stupid (but im sure we all hate it).
 
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