More Americans Are Having Trouble Cutting Back on Cannabis, Study Finds
More Americans Are Having Trouble Cutting Back on Cannabis, Study Finds
Vanessa EtienneWed, August 19, 2026 at 9:00 PM UTC
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Woman holding cannabisCredit: Getty -
A study found cannabis use increased among men and women from 2021 to 2024
About 30% of users showed symptoms of cannabis use disorder, a condition causing distress and difficulty quitting
Experts link rising cannabis use disorder to higher THC levels in products driven by market demand
More Americans are having trouble quitting or cutting back their cannabis use as the drug continues to grow in popularity nationwide.
A new study — published Wednesday, August 19 in JAMA Psychiatry — analyzed the increase in cannabis use among nearly 187,000 adults between 2021 and 2024.
Researchers found that 26% of men reported using the drug in 2024, compared to 22% in 2021. Additionally, 21% of women said they used the drug in 2024, compared to 18% in 2021.
The study also found that 9% of men and 6% of women reported symptoms of cannabis use disorder in 2024. However, about 30% showed symptoms consistent with cannabis use disorder.
Cannabis use disorder is a mental health condition in which you have a problematic pattern of cannabis/marijuana use that causes distress and/or impairs your life, according to the Cleveland Clinic. Symptoms can include continuing cannabis use when it causes interpersonal problems, taking cannabis in larger amounts, struggling to cut back or quit use of cannabis, and experiencing withdrawal symptoms, which you relieve by taking more.
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Cannabis plantCredit: Leon Neal/AFP via Getty
“The notion that cannabis is not addictive may basically be incorrect,” Dr. Nora D. Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse and study author, told The New York Times.
Volkow and other experts pointed to most states allowing medical use of cannabis and many states allowing recreational use. The increased demand has led to more cannabis products, including those with higher amounts of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the psychoactive chemical in marijuana that causes a high.
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“It’s a completely different story,” she said. “The dosing is actually enabling us to see the emergence of the addictiveness. The higher the content of the drug, the higher the risk for addiction.”
“This study highlights an anticipated consequence of rising levels of use and increasing potency of the product,” Dr. Daniel Myran, an assistant professor of family medicine at University of Ottawa who studies health outcomes associated with cannabis use, told the outlet. “The product is really changing under enormous pressure from market forces to increase the THC content — that’s where there’s consumer demand.”
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Source: “AOL Breaking”
