Skip to content

Effects of marijuana on human reaction time and motor control.

T O Kvålseth

Perceptual and Motor Skills December 1977 DOI: 10.2466/pms.1977.45.3.935 (opens in new tab)

Read Full Text
Relevant Not relevant

Study at a glance

AI-extracted from the abstract
Characteristics Within-subjects experimental study Peer reviewed
Sample size 6
Population Six experienced marijuana users
Dose 0, 6.5, and 19.5-26.0 mg delta9-THC
Topics Cannabis
Key findings Marijuana did not significantly affect simple or complex reaction time, and linear movement time was significantly reduced after smoking. Rotary movement time was not significantly affected, and interactions with task complexity were insignificant. Error rates for both movement types increased significantly with dose, especially for linear movements.

Abstract

In this research were analyzed the effects of marijuana on human reaction time and on performance for motor responses involving both linear and rotary serial arm movements aimed at a target. A total of six experienced marijuana users served as subjects and three drug conditions (dose levels) were used, i.e., 0, 6.5, and 19.5-26.0 mg delta9-THC. The results showed that (a) (simple and complex) reaction time was not significantly affected by marijuana or by the interaction between drug conditions and the amount of information transmitted during the task, (b) linear movement time was significantly reduced after smoking marijuana, while rotary movement time was not significantly affected, (c) interaction between drug conditions and task complexity was insignificant in the case of both linear and rotary movements, and (d) error rates for the two types of motor movements increased significantly and especially for linear movements as the dose level increased.

Comparable studies

Other experimental studies on cannabis, most cited first.

Study Year Design Participants
Smoked Cannabis' Psychomotor and Neurocognitive Effects in Occasional and Frequent Smokers Occasional (<2x/week) and frequent (≥4x/week) cannabis smokers 2015 Controlled within-subjects study n = 25
Dissociable effects of cannabis with and without cannabidiol on the human brain’s resting-state functional connectivity Healthy volunteers experienced with cannabis but not regular users 2019 Within-subjects experimental design n = 17
Which biological and self-report measures of cannabis use predict cannabis dependency and acute psychotic-like effects? Young cannabis users 2018 Observational study (naturalistic, within-subject counterbalanced design) n = 410
Cannabis Essential Oil: A Preliminary Study for the Evaluation of the Brain Effects Healthy volunteers 2018 Experimental study n = 5
Coming off cannabis: a cognitive and magnetic resonance imaging study in patients with multiple sclerosis Patients with multiple sclerosis who began using cannabis after disease onset, used it... 2019 Quasi-experimental study with odd-even allocation n = 40

Citations in the library

Cited by 3

Related reading

Explore topics

Cannabis