Cannabis 'can cause aggression in kids'

01/02/2006

Kids who smoke cannabis are more likely to display aggressive behaviour and underperform at school, a new study has claimed.

No, I would never have believed that. Also, WTF are they giving kids marijuana to smoke? Then again, this is the Netherlands, and they are weird.

Dutch researchers found the drug did not cause children to become withdrawn or develop mental problems like depression, which has been suggested in other studies, but could lead to delinquency and aggression.

So instead of being depressed, they attack you. How is that an improvement?

The team from the Trimbos Institute, a mental health research centre in the Netherlands, gave questionnaires on drug use to young people aged 12 to 16.

They found that 17 per cent of them had used the drug in the previous year.

Sounds like here.

They also found that those who were heavy users - who took the drug 40 times a year - had poorer school grades than non-users.

And they say marijuana has no ill effects.

Heavy cannabis users also experienced thought and attention problems. They were also nine per cent more likely to report poor school performance.

I have that problem, but I can't blame it on a convenient drug. Sucks to be me.

The team, led by Professor Karin Monshouwer, wrote in the British Journal of Psychiatry: "This study shows that at young ages the use of cannabis is already strongly associated with delinquent and aggressive behaviour, even after controlling for strong confounders such as alcohol use and smoking.

Young delinquents often grow up to be old delinquents.

"The strength of the associations increased with higher frequency of use, and significant associations were only present among those who had used cannabis recently."

If you understood that, my hat is off to you. If I was wearing one.

It was also found that children who had used the drug, but not in the previous year, had the same risk of developing aggressive behaviour as non-users.

Professor Monshouwer and her team concluded: "In a country with a liberal drug policy like the Netherlands, cannabis use is associated with aggression and delinquency, just as in other countries.

How about sexual promiscuity?

"Cannabis use was not associated with internalising problems."

The researchers said there was no significant difference in the findings between genders.

Last year, a report by the Schools Health Education Unit found over half of British 14- and 15-year-olds had been offered cannabis, a quarter of whom had taken it.

I suspect the drug rate in the US is about the same.

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