# NEUROCOGNITIVE CONSEQUENCES OF ADOLESCENT MARIJUANA USE

> **NIH NIH R01** · WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY · 2021 · $581,984

## Abstract

Project Summary (Abstract)
The overall goal of the proposed study is to delineate consequences and determinants of adolescent
marijuana (MJ) consumption using the co-twin control approach. MJ is the most commonly used illicit
drug with a typical onset of use in adolescence, a period of continued brain development and increased
vulnerability to detrimental effects of drugs of abuse. Previous studies have established associations between
chronic and/or early MJ exposure and alterations in brain function, behavior, and cognition, including deficits in
self-regulation of behavior and increased impulsivity that may increase the risk for transition to the use of
“harder” drugs, as well as neurocognitive dysfunctions that resemble those seen in schizophrenia. However,
most existing studies relied on case-control, correlational designs precluding strong causal inferences. It
remains unclear whether deficits found in MJ users represent the consequences of MJ use or, conversely, pre-
existing factors of risk for MJ use. This unresolved issue represents a critical gap in knowledge that hinders the
development of prevention, intervention, and treatment methods, as well as evidence-based MJ related public
policy. The proposed study seeks to address this gap in knowledge through the implementation of the powerful
co-twin control design. In monozygotic twin pairs discordant for MJ use history, twins have the same degree of
genetic liability and share many critical aspects of environment but differ with respect to MJ exposure. Thus,
the non-exposed twins represent ideal controls for their MJ-exposed co-twins. The co-twin control method is
thus a cost- and time-efficient approach that can be viewed as complimentary to longitudinal studies that
require very large samples to ensure sufficient representation of high-exposure cases and long time (about 10
years) to achieve conclusive results. The proposed study will use a set of theory-driven experimental
paradigms to collect neurophysiological, behavioral, and cognitive measures that tap into specific
neurocognitive component processes that have been linked to (i) impulsivity and addiction risk (response
inhibition, error monitoring, and selective attention) and/or (ii) increased risk for schizophrenia (sensory and
sensorimotor gating, auditory deviance detection). These measures will be assessed in 280 adolescent and
young adult twins with and without MJ use history aged 19-36. The twins will be drawn from existing
epidemiological studies of the PI and co-investigators and selected, based on existing data, to ensure sufficient
variability in the age of onset, extent of exposure, length of abstinence, and twin pair concordance versus
discordance for MJ use. Specific aims will be: 1) To examine associations between MJ use and
neurocognitive functioning in adolescents and young adults and to determine the extent to which these
associations depend on severity of exposure, age of onset of MJ use, and length of abstinenc...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10057378
- **Project number:** 5R01DA040716-05
- **Recipient organization:** WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Andrey P. Anokhin
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $581,984
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-02-15 → 2022-11-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10057378

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10057378, NEUROCOGNITIVE CONSEQUENCES OF ADOLESCENT MARIJUANA USE (5R01DA040716-05). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10057378. Licensed CC0.

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