{"id":10472,"date":"2024-10-21T18:55:49","date_gmt":"2024-10-21T18:55:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/?p=6804745&amp;preview=true&amp;preview_id=6804745"},"modified":"2024-10-21T18:55:49","modified_gmt":"2024-10-21T18:55:49","slug":"cannabis-on-the-mind-study-finds-connection-between-sleep-memory-and-marijuana-use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/cannabis-on-the-mind-study-finds-connection-between-sleep-memory-and-marijuana-use\/","title":{"rendered":"Cannabis on the mind: Study finds connection between sleep, memory and marijuana use"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0 5px 5px;float:right;height:100px;\"><script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/cannabis-on-the-mind-study-finds-connection-between-sleep-memory-and-marijuana-use\/\" send=\"true\" layout=\"standard\" width=\"450\" show_faces=\"false\" font=\"arial\" action=\"like\" colorscheme=\"light\"><\/fb:like><\/div><div class=\"media_block\"><\/div>\n<div><img src=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/cannabis-on-the-mind-study-finds-connection-between-sleep-memory-and-marijuana-use.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" \/><\/div>\n<p><strong>Miriam Fauzia, The Dallas Morning News<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>DALLAS \u2014 As public support for marijuana decriminalization grows, new research is shedding light on the drug\u2019s impact on sleep and memory.<\/p>\n<p>In a recent study published in The American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse, researchers at the University of Texas at Dallas found that adults with cannabis use disorder tended to experience poorer sleep than those without the condition. They also performed more poorly on tests assessing visuospatial memory, or the ability to retain and process information about an object\u2019s appearance and location.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat this paper does is provide a bridge between the two things\u201d \u2014 sleep and memory \u2014 \u201cand helps establish that perhaps some of the memory impairment associated with cannabis use is indeed due to poor sleep quality,\u201d said Christopher Verrico, an associate professor of psychiatry research at Baylor College of Medicine, who was not involved in the study.<\/p>\n<p>The study also underscores the many unknowns surrounding marijuana\u2019s impact on the human body and the need to be cautious when using it, said Ashley Garling, a clinical assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin College of Pharmacy who was not involved in the study.<\/p>\n<p>In a 2022 survey of more than 27,000 people between ages 16 and 65 in the U.S. and Canada, almost half reported using cannabis to help with sleep. In another survey, commissioned by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine in 2023, a quarter of Americans reported occasionally or regularly using pot to help them stay or fall asleep. And parents with children under 18 living at home were more likely than nonparents to use marijuana as a sleep aid \u2014 30% versus 19%.<\/p>\n<p>Whether marijuana actually helps you fall asleep isn\u2019t clear. Some studies and surveys suggest it doesn\u2019t improve sleep while others suggest it might, particularly in people with conditions that interfere with sleep like chronic pain.<\/p>\n<p>Additionally, the two main active ingredients in marijuana \u2014 delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), a psychoactive chemical that makes you feel high, and the non-psychoactive cannabidiol (CBD) \u2014 influence sleep in different ways. Low doses of THC may improve sleep while higher doses may disrupt it. The opposite is true for CBD.<\/p>\n<p>Studies have shown that long-term marijuana use can impair cognitive function depending on what age someone starts using. A 2016 study tracking over 3,000 middle-aged adults over two decades found that for those who used pot for more than five years, their verbal memory was worse compared to those who used marijuana less often. A 2018 study found that young people who used marijuana frequently were more likely to score slightly lower on memory tests and not do as well at learning new information and higher-level problem solving compared to their non-using peers. A separate 2018 study found cognitive performance among young cannabis users improved when they stopped using.<\/p>\n<p>But studying marijuana\u2019s effect on both memory and sleep had not been done before, said Francesca Filbey, director of the University of Texas at Dallas\u2019 Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory of Addictive Disorders, who led the new study.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMemory has been widely known to be a potential impairment as a result of cannabis use,\u201d Filbey said. \u201cBut we don\u2019t know yet what the mechanisms are. We especially don\u2019t know how that relates to people who use cannabis as a sleep aid.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>To answer that, Filbey and Tracy Brown, the study\u2019s first author and a PhD student at the University of Texas at Dallas, surveyed more than 200 people from Dallas and the Netherlands about their sleep quality within the past week. One hundred and forty-one respondents had cannabis use disorder,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/cannabis\/health-effects\/cannabis-use-disorder.html\">a condition<\/a>\u00a0marked by a dependency on marijuana that affects three in 10 people who use it; the other 87 had used marijuana in the past but not as frequently and not within the three months prior to the study.<\/p>\n<p>Those with cannabis use disorder reported more sleep problems compared to the other group. They also tended to perform not as well on tests assessing their visuospatial memory.<\/p>\n<p>While this finding indirectly ties marijuana use to memory, Brown said there is likely an underlying mechanism: the endocannabinoid system, a recently discovered signaling network that regulates sleep, learning and memory, among other functions. Cannabinoids, the chemicals at the heart of this system, are produced naturally by our bodies and are found in marijuana.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat we know about the endocannabinoid system is that it\u2019s a regulatory process within its own right, but it signals circadian rhythms, our sleep-wake cycles,\u201d Brown said, with some hormones spiking in the morning and others lowering in the evening. He added that sleep is crucial for the brain\u2019s ability to consolidate new information into memories.<\/p>\n<p>The next step to exploring marijuana\u2019s impact on sleep and memory will be to study brain activity during sleep to gauge how restorative it is in real time. Future studies will also need to investigate how differing amounts of THC and CBD in the body affect sleep and memory, said Garling of UT Austin, who added that the amounts vary based on how cannabis is taken.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"related left\"> <\/aside>\n<p>How biological sex affects the interplay between marijuana, sleep and memory will also need to be considered because this study had more male participants than female. Studies looking at long-term cannabis use have found that sleep in women is impacted at a higher rate compared to men.<\/p>\n<p>Filbey and Brown emphasized this study is just the first step to a better understanding of how cannabis impacts the brain and that more studies are needed given the public health concern posed by its widespread acceptance.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith any type of medication, you have all these different clinical trials. But [with] cannabis, it\u2019s putting the cart before the horse,\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe\u2019re legalizing it, not necessarily at the federal level but the state level, for medicinal and recreational [use]. But the fact that it\u2019s being legalized for medicinal use is informing people that this is something safe or effective. We don\u2019t have that kind of research yet.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Under federal law, marijuana is classified as a Schedule I drug, with a high risk of abuse and no legal use. Though exceptions can be made with permission from the Drug Enforcement Agency, this classification has posed a significant roadblock for clinical research, Filbey said. But she is optimistic that will soon change. In April, the DEA announced that it would consider bumping marijuana down to a Schedule III drug. It would remain a controlled substance, but the move would acknowledge its potential medical uses and make research easier.<\/p>\n<p>Medicinal marijuana in Texas is legal only for people with conditions including severe epilepsy, autism, cancer and PTSD. Outside of those conditions, cannabis use and possession continues to be penalized.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><em>\u00a92024 The Dallas Morning News. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Originally Published: October 21, 2024 at 12:17 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><\/div>\n<p>As public support for marijuana decriminalization grows, new research is shedding light on the drug\u2019s impact on sleep and memory. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[52,6892,77,9,9568,5019,1,3,6923,61,1736],"tags":[2632,6893,2655,9584,5022,6924],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10472"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10472\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}