Jones Éamon, Vlachou Styliani
Neuropsychopharmacology Division, Behavioural Neuroscience Laboratory, School of Psychology, Faculty of Science and Health, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9, D09 Y074 Dublin, Ireland.
Pharmaceuticals (Basel). 2021 Nov 16;14(11):1165. doi: 10.3390/ph14111165.
Cannabis use can be traced back to several centuries before the Common Era, when it was used for industrial, medicinal and recreational purposes. More recently, over 100 different cannabinoid compounds have been identified, one of which is cannabidiol (CBD), a compound widely used for anti-inflammatory and anxiolytic treatment. The literature surrounding the cognitive effects of CBD is limited, with most studies focusing on the effects of other cannabinoids on cognition. To expand this literature, this study investigated whether CBD causes significant differences to working memory (WM) functioning, as measured by the N-back task. It was hypothesised that CBD does not cause statistically significant differences to WM. In all, 54 participants, 33 females and 21 males, were recruited, with a mean age of 32.63 years. Of these 54 participants, 26 reported using CBD and no other cannabinoids, while 28 reported not using any cannabinoid. The participants were instructed to answer a short online survey to gather basic demographic data and to complete an online N-back task to measure WM. For the computerised N-back task, the participants completed a practice and three test blocks, where they were instructed to respond to whether a series of letter stimuli were presented one trial back (1-back), two trials back (2-back) or three trials back (3-back). Multivariate analysis of covariance yielded no statistically significant difference on either response time or response accuracy data between groups after controlling for how long the participants use CBD and for what reason they use CBD. These results support our hypothesis that CBD does not cause significant changes to WM functioning. Further research is greatly needed to investigate the long-term effects of CBD use on WM and on general cognitive functioning.
大麻的使用可以追溯到公元前几个世纪，当时它被用于工业、医药和娱乐目的。最近，已鉴定出100多种不同的大麻素化合物，其中之一是大麻二酚（CBD），一种广泛用于抗炎和抗焦虑治疗的化合物。关于CBD认知作用的文献有限，大多数研究集中在其他大麻素对认知的影响上。为了扩充这方面的文献，本研究调查了CBD是否会导致工作记忆（WM）功能产生显著差异，通过N-回溯任务进行测量。研究假设是CBD不会对WM产生统计学上的显著差异。总共招募了54名参与者，33名女性和21名男性，平均年龄为32.63岁。在这54名参与者中，26人报告使用CBD且不使用其他大麻素，而28人报告不使用任何大麻素。参与者被要求回答一份简短的在线调查问卷以收集基本人口统计学数据，并完成一项在线N-回溯任务以测量WM。对于计算机化的N-回溯任务，参与者完成了一个练习块和三个测试块，在这些测试块中，他们被要求回答一系列字母刺激是在一个试次之前（1-回溯）、两个试次之前（2-回溯）还是三个试次之前（3-回溯）呈现的。在控制了参与者使用CBD的时长以及使用原因后，多变量协方差分析显示两组之间在反应时间或反应准确性数据上均无统计学上的显著差异。这些结果支持了我们的假设，即CBD不会导致WM功能产生显著变化。非常需要进一步的研究来调查使用CBD对WM和一般认知功能的长期影响。
