Reefer Madness 2.0: What Marijuana Science Says, And Doesn’t Say
A 2017 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) report, which synthesized all the available research on marijuana, concluded in part: “There is substantial evidence of a statistical association between cannabis use and the development of schizophrenia or other psychoses, with the highest risk among the most frequent users.” An important piece of Berenson’s argument is that rates of marijuana use have risen at around the same time as an increase in diagnoses of schizophrenia and other forms of psychosis. Nonetheless, Gladwell offers up Berenson’s same misleading statistics on violence without interrogating their accuracy, mentions two studies suggesting a gateway effect while ignoring plenty of contradictory research, and highlights some data generated by a New York University professor and friend of Berenson’s, which, while they may be valid, have not been peer reviewed or otherwise assessed by experts.
Source: undark.org