Natalie Wilcox, “Co-Use of Alcohol and Cannabis: Associations with Depression and Anxiety Symptoms in Adolescents”
Mentors: Krista Lisdahl and Elizabeth Stinson, Psychology
Alcohol and cannabis are frequently used substances among adolescents and have been associated with negative mental health outcomes. Specifically, research has shown alcohol (Hassan, 2018) and cannabis use (Lisdahl et al., 2007; Wright et al., 2016) independently linked with greater depressive symptoms, with the relationship with anxiety symptoms being less clear (Keith et al., 2015; McKenzie et al., 2011). Limited research has examined the effects of alcohol and cannabis co-use on mental health, despite co-use being associated with greater negative social consequences than either substance alone (Yurasek et al., 2017) and evidence regarding increased risk for depression (Pacek et al., 2013). The current study aims to examine the relationship between number of past year alcohol and cannabis co-use days and depression and anxiety levels in adolescents after a three-week abstinence period. The sample included 90 participants ages 16-25 (M age = 21.14, 44% female). Past year alcohol, cannabis, and co-use days were determined by self-report on the Timeline Followback, which assessed frequency and quantity of substance use. State anxiety levels and depression symptoms were measured on the State Trait Anxiety Inventory and Beck Depression Inventory, respectively. Separate multiple linear regressions were conducted to evaluate whether past year alcohol use, cannabis use, and co-use days were significantly associated with sub-clinical anxiety and depression symptoms, after controlling for age and sex. Results indicated that the overall models accounting for substance use days and demographics were not significantly associated with anxiety and depression levels (p’s>0.05). Findings suggest that chronic effects of alcohol, cannabis, and co-use are not significantly related to mood symptoms after a period of abstinence. While not directly assessed here, instead, substance use may relate to mood more acutely. Future longitudinal research is necessary to provide more causal models and understanding of the effects of substance use on mood symptoms.
Interesting study. Good job!
Thank you very much! Your feedback is greatly appreciated!
This is very good work. Excellent job identifying a lacuna in the research and carefully selecting your sample–as well as suggesting future directions of inquiry. Disconfirming hypotheses is just as important and novel discovery!
Thank you so much for your input! I agree that these results, although not confirming a strong relationship, are important for future research! I appreciate your feedback and thanks for watching!
Hi Natalie! Great job explaining this–what an interesting study! I’d be curious to see the results with the BDI and STAI at the start of the abstinence period, what do you expect those results might look like? And, how might those fluctuate across the three-week abstinence period? Nice work on this poster and keep up the good work!
Hi Ryan, thank you so much for watching this! I always appreciate your critique and questions. Looking at past studies on acute effects of alcohol and cannabis use, I would anticipate the initial BDI and STAI scores to appear different (and perhaps show a stronger relationship) than after the three-week abstinence period. Anxiety, for instance, has often been observed as an acute symptom from cannabis use, but this may lessen over an abstinence period. Thus, the abstinence period may have some limitations.
As for fluctuations across the abstinence period, this would be an interesting area to measure more. One limitation is that past studies evaluate substance use disorders as well as anxiety and mood disorders, while our study excludes for individuals with psychiatric disorders. Further, some studies measure acute effects or changes over time with intervention, while our study does not use clinical intervention techniques. Co-use of alcohol and cannabis is understudied, and few studies closely mimic the ABCD study in our methods measuring mental health symptoms. In the case of anxiety and cannabis, for example, in a study by Crippa, et al. (2009) (cited in the reference section of the poster), findings were unclear on whether cannabis use may trigger long-term anxiety. Observing participants over the abstinence period may lead to some interesting findings!
Hello everyone! Thank you so much for watching my presentation! To provide a bit of an introduction, I am finishing up my undergrad in psychology, and I will be applying for master’s programs in clinical social work this fall! In addition to the BraIN lab with Dr. Lisdahl, I conduct behavioral therapy with children with Autism. I believe this research will be helpful for me in understanding moods and substance use in future clinical settings.
Comments are welcome, and I have appreciated all of your feedback thus far! Also, my apologies for the audio error – at about 3:10, the audio repeats itself, so my speaking part plays twice. Feel free to disregard the repeated portion after the 3:10 minute mark. I hope you all enjoyed my presentation as much as I did working on it!