Does Pot Use Cause Psychosis, Or Does Psychosis Cause Pot Use?
Cannabis Bud Wikimedia CommonsReefer madness! Pot causes psychosis! Except maybe not. The link between marijuana and psychosis in teenagers is ripe for a correlation-causation debacle. Studies have indicated there's a relationship between psychotic symptoms and above-average marijuana use, but the reasons behind that correlation are not clear. Does pot cause psychosis in teens, or are teens with mental health issues retreating into marijuana use to deal with those issues? Dutch researchers set up a study to figure that out. Researchers surveyed 2,000 teens in the Netherlands through their adolescence. Subjects' were asked about their marijuana use, then asked questions designed to gauge their mental state ("Do you ever see things that others do not?"). The research team also factored in alcohol and tobacco use and a family history of mental illness. If the teens reported mental-health issues years after smoking marijuana, the researchers assumed maybe pot was the cause....