We’re abundantly familiar with the stereotypes surrounding cannabis use that still prevail in today’s world, namely tropes embraced over the years in the media and among anti-reform advocates deeming that regular cannabis use makes people lazy and unproductive.
As cannabis use is becoming increasingly more common, many regular consumers will attest that this broad assumption is far from the truth, but a new study has provided further insight on how regular cannabis users tend to function after consuming.
Ultimately, researchers found that getting high was associated with more positive emotions and fewer negative emotions in consumers, with minimal effects on motivation or objective effort willingness. They also found that frequent cannabis use had a lack of “hangover” effects.
The Changing Nature of the Cannabis Consumer
Researchers at the University of Toronto conducted the new study, published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science, in an effort to describe the effects of chronic cannabis use on emotions, motivation, effort and self-regulation in everyday life.
The study begins by noting the increased prevalence of cannabis use today, with nearly 200 million people using it worldwide and cannabis ranking as the fourth-most-used recreational drug following caffeine, alcohol and tobacco.
“Despite its wide use and increasing legal and societal acceptance, surprisingly little is known about its effects among habitual users in everyday life. Instead, research on cannabis tends to treat it as a drug of abuse, focused mostly on the health risks of overuse and dependence,” the study reads. “Here, we focus on what is missing, describing the everyday experience of getting high among habitual users, examining reasons they get high, its possible salutary emotional effects, and its surprising lack of costs to motivation and industriousness.”
Researchers go on to recognize that today’s cannabis users come from “all walks of life,” …
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Author: Keegan Williams / High Times
