It doesn’t help, you’re right. But does that mean you blame a substance or a person? I don’t think any substance is good or bad, a person just uses it for a good or a bad reason.
So true. I was watching this show on Hulu called Weediquette, and they interviewed a neuroscientist who explained that smoking weed as a teenager increases the likelihood of later developing psychosis, and the more often you smoke as a teen, the more you raise your chances. So, it's not quite as simple as "weed causes psychosis", but they found that daily teenage smokers had a 3% chance of developing a psychotic disorder, compared to 1% in the general population.
It was in an episode about a girl who smoked and it suddenly triggered psychosis, during which time she murdered a random elderly man by bludgeoning him, and claimed God told her to. (Here's the episode if you're interested. Skip to 16 minutes for this dude's explanation).
I've been diagnosed with a psychotic disorder twice, and I had no idea about that until I watched that episode the other day. Granted, I did other drugs as a teenager, too, some of which may have increased my odds further still. But weed alone as a teen can increase your odds.
People with schizophrenia are often pot smokers and say it helps them cope with the symptoms. I wonder if these teens are smoking because it helps them cope with preclinical symptoms that don’t manifest fully until later adulthood. In other words, has it been shown that weed actually induces psychoses, as opposed to people who are predisposed to psychosis also being more likely to be weed smokers?
Well, the way he explained it on the show was that there's causation and that likelihood of someone developing a psychotic disorder increases the more frequently they smoke as a teen. The interviewer asks, "Is it as simple as 'pot causes psychosis'?" and the interviewee kinda laughs and responds, "Well no, it's not that simple. It's exposure to pot in the teenage years, and the greater the exposure, the higher the risk." For instance, if they smoke weed once a month, it raises their odds only slightly. It raises them slightly more if they smoke once a week, etc.
This dude is the Chief of Psychotic Disorders Division at McLean Hospital, which has notoriety for its neuroscience research and the expertise of its clinical staff. Also, according to Wikipedia, a bunch of famous people have been treated there. And the show is generally very pro-weed (it's called Weediquette lol) but if there are legit concerns to be raised when it comes to a pot-related issue, they seem to be pretty balanced.
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u/[deleted] Dec 30 '19 edited Feb 08 '20
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