Abusing cannabis can cause, in those who consume it, an accentuated distortion of memories , making them believe that they have gone through situations that are far from resembling the real thing; that is, the excessive and chronic consumption of this psychoactive substance generates false memories, according to the latest study carried out by the Institute for Biomedical Research of the Hospital de Sant Pau and the Autonomous University of Barcelona (Spain) and which is collected in the journal Molecular Psychiatry .
Memory problems associated with cannabis use are not new, but this research goes further, concluding that cannabis users are also more likely to experience fictitious memories.
“A common phenomenon is having false memories of situations experienced in childhood and that we think we remember because people around us have told us many times,” the authors explain.
For their experiment, the scientists had the participation of a group of chronic cannabis users and a control group . All of them were subjected to a memory test with words that they had to learn. After a few minutes memorizing them, the volunteers saw the old words together with new words both semantically related to the first and not at all. The participants had to remember which words belonged to the first group, which they had previously memorized.
The results, which were contrasted with magnetic resonance imaging tests while conducting the experiment, revealed that cannabis users believed they had seen the words that were semantically related to those on the first list much more frequently than the control group . In addition, brain scans showed less activation in the brains of cannabis users in the area associated with memory processing and control of cognitive resources.
Research shows that cannabis users suffer the consequences of this drug on brain mechanisms that make it easier for us to distinguish between everything that is real and what is not. This negative effect lasts even weeks after consumption has stopped, according to the study.
