Does Cannabis Lower Your IQ? – Cannabis News, Lifestyle

Does Cannabis Lower Your IQ? According to a recent study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry, the answer is yes. According to the study, your IQ drops by 5.5 points if you consume from childhood to midlife. They also have memory and attention problems.

But how accurate are these results?

Conflicting Studies

Many studies have focused on cannabis and IQ. A 2001 study found no link between cannabis smokers and cognitive impairment. A 2005 study came to the same conclusion.

Then some studies suggest the opposite. These studies often point to a smaller hippocampus in long-term users as evidence that cannabis lowers your IQ.

The new study, which followed nearly 1,000 people in New Zealand aged 3 to 45, concludes that future research is needed to establish causality.

Does a smaller hippocampus lower your IQ?

The hippocampus is the region of the brain responsible for learning and memory. We have two hippocampi, one for the left side of the brain and one for the right side. The hippocampus plays an important role in consolidating short-term memory into long-term memory. It is also crucial for spatial navigation.

In a famous study, neuroscientists discovered that London taxi drivers had an exceptionally large hippocampus, as they could navigate 25,000 complex city streets from memory.

Researchers wanted to solve the chicken and egg problem. Does the hippocampus grow when navigating London’s busy streets? Or do people with a larger hippocampus become successful taxi drivers?

connection to gray matter

Assuming the latest study is correct and long-term cannabis use decreases your hippocampus, does it matter?

Scientists associate a smaller hippocampus with a higher risk of dementia and Alzheimer’s. But it’s also possible to enlarge your hippocampus through exercise and eating foods high in omega-3 fatty acids.

But research suggests that the size of your hippocampus isn’t as crucial as the hippocampus’s connectivity and ability to communicate with other brain regions. And this improves with spatial training, such as B. memorizing and driving on the busy streets of London.

A growing number of neuroscientists are beginning to see what the research says. Changes in brain volume, gray matter and white matter, work together to optimize cognitive function. Gray matter hides neurons in specific brain regions, while white matter facilitates communication between different areas.

So does cannabis lower your IQ?

So does cannabis lower your IQ or not? If the latest study is true, if you start smoking in childhood and well into middle life, your hippocampus appears to be smaller than those who haven’t used in all those years.

This, of course, is the conclusion of the one study, and even it concluded that more research is needed to establish causality.

But assuming the results are confirmed, what is the difference between cannabis and other activities or lifestyle choices that will lead to cognitive decline later in life?

And what if you combine cannabis with exercise, meditation or yoga? Do the activities that enlarge the hippocampus offset the potential damage cannabis does? Will a cannabis smoker who is physically active and eats a healthy diet fare better than a non-user who eats junk and never exercises?

And let’s say a long-time cannabis user has a smaller hippocampus. What does that tell us about the functional connectivity of their brains?

It’s easier for the corporate press to run the headline “Cannabis lowers your IQ” than to question the epistemology of the research.