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Teens who use cannabis are more likely to perform poorly at school. They're also more likely to have mental health symptoms of anxiety and depression. Those are the findings of a new study in the journal Pediatrics. NPR's Rhitu Chatterjee has more.
RHITU CHATTERJEE, BYLINE: The study drew on survey data from tens of thousands of eighth, 10th and 12th graders between 2018 and 2022. The good news is that a majority - nearly three-quarters - reported they did not use cannabis. Dr. Ryan Sultan is a child and adolescent psychiatrist at Columbia University and lead author of the study.
RYAN SULTAN: About 26% are reporting having had some cannabis use at some point.
CHATTERJEE: Only 8% of the teens reported using cannabis often.
SULTAN: The higher-frequency group are individuals who are using weekly or daily or near daily.
CHATTERJEE: He says the others use it once a month or even less.
SULTAN: Most teens that are using cannabis are low-frequency users. And what we still found was poor academic performance seen in things like GPA and truancy.
CHATTERJEE: And they had no college plans. These teens also had a higher chance of having emotional distress and symptoms of anxiety and depression compared to those who didn't use cannabis.
Psychologist Krista Lisdahl studies substance use in adolescence at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Lisdahl wasn't involved in the new study. She notes that the more often teens used cannabis, the more likely they were to struggle at school and emotionally.
KRISTA LISDAHL: It's once again more evidence of these dose-dependent links between cannabis use, especially recent nearly daily use, being linked with detrimental academic outcomes, emotional outcomes.
CHATTERJEE: She says recent studies by her and others show that the brains of teens who use cannabis are different from other teens. Imaging studies show differences in parts of the brain related to executive functioning, emotional regulation and problem solving. Lisdahl says another finding is that teenagers who use cannabis...
LISDAHL: Tend to show this pattern of having to use more of their prefrontal cortex to do a cognitive task. So it looks like their brain is working harder to get the same result.
CHATTERJEE: While studies have yet to show that cannabis causes these outcomes, Lisdahl says it doesn't change the message for teens.
LISDAHL: The message is to delay cannabis use as long as you can, especially while the brain is developing.
CHATTERJEE: And that development continues until age 25.
Rhitu Chatterjee, NPR News.
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