Using even a small amount of cannabis may cause changes in the brain volume of teenagers, according to a study.The study, published in The Journal of Neuroscience, is the first to find evidence that an increase in grey matter volume in certain parts of the adolescent brain is a likely consequence of low-level marijuana use.<\/p>\n
Few studies have looked at the effects of the first few uses of a drug, said Hugh Garavan, a professor at the University of Vermont in the US.Most researchers focus on heavy marijuana users later in life and compare them against non-users. These new findings identify an important new area of focus.<\/p>\n
Their brains showed more grey matter volume in areas where cannabis binds, known as cannabinoid receptors, compared to the children who did not use the drug.<\/p>\n
The biggest differences in grey matter were in the amygdala, which is involved in fear and other emotion-related processes, and in the hippocampus, involved in memory development and spatial abilities.<\/p>\n
The researchers ruled out the likelihood that the cannabis-using kids had pre-existing differences in grey matter thickness or that they had specific personality traits that might correlate with the difference in brain makeup.<\/p>\n
“You are changing your brain with just one or two joints. Most people would likely assume that one or two joints would have no impact on the brain,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Using even a small amount of cannabis may cause changes in the brain volume of teenagers, according to a study.The study, published in The Journal of Neuroscience, is the first to find evidence that an increase in grey matter volume in certain parts of the adolescent brain is a likely consequence of low-level marijuana use. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":52650,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[239],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52649"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52649\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52651,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52649\/revisions\/52651"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}