25 I forgot, does marijuana cause short-term memory impairment?
Description
This article is from the Hemp / Cannabis / Marijuana FAQ, by Brian S. Julin verdant@twain.ucs.umass.edu with numerous contributions by others.
25 I forgot, does marijuana cause short-term memory impairment?
The effect of marijuana on memory is its most dramatic
and the easiest to notice. Many inexperienced marijuana
users find that they have very strange, sudden and
unexpected memory lapses. These usually take the form of
completely forgetting what you were talking about when you
were right in the middle of saying something important.
However, these symptoms only occur while a person is `high'.
They do not carry over or become permanent, and examinations
of extremely heavy users has not shown any memory or
thinking problems. More experienced marijuana users seem to
be able to remember about as well as they do when they are
not `high.'
Studies which have claimed to show short-term memory
impairment have not stood up to scrutiny and have not been
duplicated. Newer studies show that marijuana does not
impair simple, real-world memory processes. Marijuana does
slow reaction time slightly, and this effect has sometimes
been misconstrued as a memory problem. To put things in
perspective, one group of researchers made a control group
hold their breath, like marijuana smokers do. Marijuana
itself only produced about twice as many effects on test
scores as breath holding. Many people use marijuana to
study. Other people cannot, for some reason, use marijuana
and do anything that involves deep thought. Nobody knows
what makes the difference.
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