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Updated: May 28, 2025
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Brain Morphology of Cannabis Users With or Without Psychosis: A Pilot MRI Study
Published on: August 18, 2020
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Gender differences in circumstances associated with cannabis use.
Erin L Martin1, Nathaniel L Baker2, Viswanathan Ramakrishnan2
1Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina, USA.
The American Journal on Addictions
|February 11, 2025
Summary
Gender influences the situations prompting cannabis use, particularly negative emotional contexts for women. Understanding these differences is key for developing targeted interventions for cannabis use disorder (CUD).
Area of Science:
- Addiction research
- Clinical psychology
- Gender studies
Background:
- Identifying triggers for cannabis use is crucial for effective interventions for cannabis use disorder (CUD).
- Circumstances surrounding drug use may differ significantly between genders.
- The Inventory of Drug Taking Situations (IDTS) measures eight distinct situational contexts for drug use.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine gender differences in IDTS scores among individuals with CUD.
- To investigate if behavioral factors like cannabis use frequency and stress levels are differentially associated with IDTS scores by gender.
Main Methods:
- Utilized baseline data from 148 nontreatment-seeking individuals diagnosed with CUD.
- Collected demographic information, IDTS scores, self-reported 90-day cannabis use, and measures of recent and childhood stress.
Main Results:
- Women with CUD reported higher cannabis use in negative affective situations (conflict, testing control, physical discomfort, unpleasant emotions) compared to men.
- Across genders, IDTS scores related to negative and pleasant emotions correlated positively with cannabis use frequency.
- Cannabis use in negative affective contexts was linked to childhood stress, while use in unpleasant emotional contexts showed a differential association with recent stress based on gender.
Conclusions:
- Significant gender-based differences exist in the situational contexts of cannabis use among individuals with CUD.
- These findings highlight the need for gender-informed therapeutic strategies in the treatment of CUD.
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