Regular use of marijuana contracts part of the brain

Scientists found that research participants who used marijuana at least three times a day had smaller orbitofrontal cortechs (OFC), part of the brain known as “the reward center”, and vital for the beneficent decision processes.

This is alarming news for marijuana users, who until recently were comforted by the fact that most of the research on the health effects of marijuana was everywhere and often contradictory in their conclusions.

But as marijuana becomes increasingly popular, now legalized in Oregon, Alaska and Washington, the latest research suggests that regular use of marijuana has significant effects on the shape, size, and performance of the brain.

These latest results detailed this week in “Processing of the National Academy of Sciences” are more reliable. While MRI scans showed that regular marijuana users had smaller orbitofrontal cortechs, they also showed a higher level of “interconnection”, as if the brain had found a way to compensate for the reduced size of the OFC.

The study found that the benefits of growing ties begin to fall after six to eight years of chronic use of marijuana.

Researchers say the findings are disturbing but unconvincing that it needs to be investigated further. But the findings offer confidence in a Harvard study published earlier this year, which found that even less regular use of marijuana (sometime a week) can have significant effects on the frontal lobe.

This is a part of the brain that should absolutely never be touched”, he told Time Hans Brewster, coauthor of this study. ”