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contributing co-author: Gacia Tachejian

Being young involves quite a bit of exciting change. There’s the end of high-school, the start of college and some measure of independence, and a whole slew of new experiences.

A recent study conducted by Judith Brooks at NYU School of Medicine has revealed that one of those experiences, smoking marijuana (weed) may be associated with more relationship conflict later in life. What’s amazing about this study is that the drug use here occurred earlier in life for most of the 534 participants, while the relationship trouble was assessed around their mid- to late-twenties.

Could other factors explain this finding?!

Now you may be thinking to yourself that there are a whole lot of other aspects of a person’s life that can affect their relationship quality and their probability of smoking weed in adolescence. You’d be right, but here’s what the researchers in this study ruled out as possible confounds (the scientific name for variables that obscure findings):

• Relationship with parents
• Aggressive tendencies
• adjustment difficulty
• gender
• education

Even after controlling for all of these things, smoking marijuana as a teen still predicted having less harmonious relationships later on in life.

Limitations

All humor aside, this research is not saying that if you smoke weed you will definitely have a lower quality relationship later. What it does point out is that, on average, given a person with similar social skills, aggressive personality, and education, the one who smoked marijuana around their mid-teens is likely to have a less satisfying relationship.

UPDATE: Before you leave another angry comment about how wrong this article is to suggest that marijuana can cause any problems ever, please read my article on the difference between causality and association; this article is talking about an association, not causality.

Citation:

Brook, J. S., Pahl, K., and Cohen, P. (2008). Associations between marijuana use during emerging adulthood and aspects of significant other relationship in young adulthood. Journal of Child and Family Studies, Vol 17, pg. 1-12.

On the way to New York city to visit my father this morning (he’s not doing so well), I saw an amazing journalistic piece on the prescription drug problem, especially as it relates to loose prescription-record keeping laws in Florida, which is apparently the reason for the five times higher rates of prescription pain medication rates in that… Continue reading | 2 Comments

I’m not a devout 12-step believer, though I think that AA and the offspring programs have some serious merit, especially when it comes to addiction treatment aftercare. In this discussion, I’m talking about all group-support based programs, including Smart Recovery and others. I’m personally a fan of non-religious groups… Continue reading | 2 Comments

The following story was shared by a young reader. I was first drawn to it because it mirrored mine to a large extent. Fortunately, John decided to pull out before he let his life go down as far as I allowed myself to go. For that, and for his courage in sharing his story, I applaud him.

John’s addiction story

My name… Continue reading

Co-authored by Jamie Felzer

If I were a betting person (I’m not really), I’d bet that most of you have been to YouTube before. For some of us the video site provides good information and for others it’s an endless source of comedy.  Either way, YouTube has also become a hallmark of the youngest generation of computer users – they love to post funny videos of their friends for… Continue reading | 1 Comment

I was talking with a friend the other night, and he asked me my opinion about the line between addiction and normal behavior. He was wondering whether I think that everyone who looks at porn is a sex addict.

I don’t. (see some of our posts on sex addiction here)

Still, the conversation made me feel like writing something about my… Continue reading | 4 Comments

I can’t hide it any longer, I just have to confess: I hate the way addiction treatment is managed nowadays. With over 25 million people meeting criteria for addictions in the U.S., only 10% are seeking treatment on a yearly basis. Sure, part of the problem is that others just don’t want it, at least yet, but there’s something else going on and it’s terrible.

The horrible pain