User:Mgdavisss3/Long-term effects of cannabis

Article body
Acute cannabis intoxication has been shown to negatively affect attention, psychomotor task ability, and short-term memory. Studies of chronic cannabis users have demonstrated, although inconsistently, a long-lasting effect on the attention span, memory function, and cognitive abilities of moderate-dose long-term users. Once cannabis use is discontinued for several months, these effects disappear, unless the user started consuming during adolescence. It is speculated that this is due to neurotoxic effects of cannabis interfering with critical brain development.

Chronic use of cannabis during adolescence, a time when the brain is still developing, is correlated in the long term with lower IQ and cognitive deficits. It is not clear, though, if cannabis use causes the problems or if the causality is in the reverse. Recent studies have shown that IQ deficits existed in some subjects before chronic cannabis use, suggesting that lower IQ may instead be a risk factor for cannabis addiction.

A prospective cohort study that took place between 1972 and 2012 investigated the association between cannabis use and neuropsychological decline. Subjects were tested at various points in their life administering multiple different neuropsychological tests. The authors concluded that:


 * persistent cannabis users show neuropsychological decline from childhood to midlife.
 * neuropsychological impact of cannabis use is global instead of restricted to specific cognitive domains
 * its effects last for longer than a week
 * the findings cannot be explained by comorbidity with dependence on other drugs.
 * the findings cannot be explained by comorbidity with schizophrenia
 * cannabis use is correlated with lower levels of education
 * the negative effect on intelligence is greater than that attributable to the lack of education.
 * ceasing consumption does not fully restore cognitive function on adolescents.

Cannabis intoxication was not only found to affect attention, psychomotor task ability, and short-term memory. It was also found that intoxicated users were facing the difficulty of having false memories.

The use of cannabis has been heavily shown to affect the working-memory network function. Using large amounts of cannabis at a time is associated with hyperactivity of the network during a working-memory task. Most of these findings are showing that people who use cannabis on a daily basis will need additional effort in order to perform certain tasks.