A new paper has found no link between marijuana use and a variety of disorders, including depression and bipolar disorder.

The study, published in the JAMA Psychiatry journal on Feb. 17, found that “cannabis use was not associated with increased risk for developing mood or anxiety disorders.” These findings contradict many earlier studies that suggest a link between marijuana use and many behavioural disorders.

Keith Humphreys, an addiction and mental-health specialist at Stanford University, tells The Washington Post the research is “a strike against the hypothesis that cannabis use causes mood and anxiety disorders.”

Photo via Shutterstock

The study adds to prior research discrediting the connection between marijuana and mental-health disorders. In fact, much of the federal government’s current information on marijuana links its use to depression. For instance the DEA, in the 2014 paper titled “The Dangers and Consequences of Marijuana Abuse,” says that marijuana is linked to depression in children, adults and animals. They also make similar claims on this marijuana fact sheet (and let’s get serious, I doubt the validity of an organization that lists “blunts” as a street name for weed).

While the study didn’t link it to mental disorders, it found a connection between cannabis use and other drug disorders and dependencies. That means, while a joint might not increase your risk of having an anxiety disorder, it could increase your dependency on alcohol or other drugs in the future.

While a joint might not increase your risk of having an anxiety disorder, it could increase your dependency on alcohol or other drugs in the future.

Photo via RECUTERS/ Andres Stapff

Keith Humphreys, an addiction and mental-health specialist at Stanford University, tells The Washington Post the research is “a strike against the hypothesis that cannabis use causes mood and anxiety disorders.” Humphreys notes, however, that the new study doesn’t address previously observed links between marijuana use and schizophrenia. Determining such a connection could be hard, he says. “I don’t know if we will ever know because it’s … hard to predict rare events, and schizophrenia is rare.”

Though it’s impossible to tell what future studies will find, the U.S. government would be wise to keep up with the news (you know, so its policies are based on informed opinions, and not stereotypes that have their roots in 80-year-old propaganda films).

Image sources: medicaldaily.com, weedist.com