Lilian Kloft, Ph.D. of the Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience at Maastricht University, in the Netherlands and colleagues set out to investigate the effects of cannabis consumption on memory formation. Earlier studies have shown that “acute and chronic exposure to cannabis” impairs verbal memory, learning, and attention. The researchers published their findings in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The impact of cannabis on memory, explain the researchers, is a particularly important issue that has attracted a lot of interest, including from a legal perspective. Convictions often rely on the testimonies and memories of eyewitnesses, but memories are sometimes false.
The team’s findings revealed that the THC group was much more prone to forming false memories than the placebo group. Furthermore, when the experiments were repeated 1 week after the THC intoxication, when the group was sober, they had the same susceptibility to forming false memories.