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A Naturalistic Examination of the Acute Effects of High-Potency Cannabis on Emotion Regulation Among Young Adults: A Pilot Study.

Jessica M Cavalli, Carrie Cuttler, Anita Cservenka

Human psychopharmacology January 2025 DOI: 10.1002/hup.2915 (opens in new tab)

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Characteristics Within-subjects observational study Pilot study Peer reviewed
Sample size 12
Population Young adult cannabis users aged 21-30 who used cannabis at least 1 day/week on average over the past year
Intervention High-potency cannabis flower
Measures Emotional Go/No-Go Task, cognitive reappraisal task
Topics Cannabis
Keywords Acute effects Cannabis administration Emotion regulation High‐potency cannabis
Key findings Participants reported more positive mood and decreased anxiety while acutely intoxicated with high-potency cannabis, but there was no evidence that acute high-potency cannabis affected implicit or explicit emotion regulation task performance.

Abstract

Despite the popular public perception that cannabis use may be beneficial for relieving mental health symptoms, the empirical evidence remains equivocal. Various legal hurdles limit the ability to research whether acute high-potency cannabis use affects mental health-related processes. Therefore, the current study used a novel methodology to examine the acute effects of high-potency cannabis flower on emotion regulation. Using a remote, within-subjects study design, 12 young adult (ages 21-30) cannabis users (who used cannabis at least 1 day/week on average across the past year) completed measures of emotion regulation while sober and acutely intoxicated in a counterbalanced manner. Participants completed the Emotional Go/No-Go Task to measure implicit emotion regulation and a cognitive reappraisal task to assess explicit emotion regulation. For the intoxication condition, participants were observed smoking cannabis flower in their homes via videoconferencing. Participants reported a more positive mood and decreases in anxiety while intoxicated. There was no evidence that acute high-potency cannabis affected participants' implicit or explicit emotion regulation task performance. Future research with larger samples might consider adopting this novel remote study design to assess the acute effects of high-potency cannabis use on different measures of emotion regulation and other health outcomes.

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

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