New Delhi: A study has found that people who regularly consume cannabis or marijuana have more empathy. Researchers at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México found through brain imaging that the brain area most commonly affected by cannabis use is related to empathy, the anterior cingulate, sensing the emotional state of others within one’s own body. There was a strong connectivity with the respective areas.
The anterior cingulate is present in the limbic system of the brain, which is involved in emotional behavior.
According to study co-author Victor Olalde-Matthews, the study’s findings “may help explore the potential effects of cannabis in aiding the treatment of conditions characterized by deficits in social interactions, such as sociopathy, social anxiety, and avoidant personality disorder.” from University. This study has been published in the Journal of Neuroscience Research.
For the study, researchers recruited 85 regular cannabis users and 51 non-users (controls). Participants completed psychometric testing and were asked to report their cannabis consumption behavior via questionnaires. Of these participants, 46 users and 34 controls also took part in a brain imaging study.
The researchers found that out of the total group, cannabis users showed a greater ability to recognize and understand other people’s emotions and impressions, as determined by the Emotional Understanding (CE) portion of the Cognitive and Affective Empathy Test. The test uses cognitive and affective approaches to measure a person’s empathic ability.
They said the score difference was found to be greater in the sample that participated in the fMRI.
“Given that the anterior cingulate is one of the main (brain) regions heavily involved in the representation of the emotional state of others, we believe that the emotional understanding scores and their brain functional connectivity are similar to those shown by regular cannabis users. The observed differences may be related to cannabis use,” the researchers wrote in their study.
“We believe that these results contribute to opening a path to further study the clinical applications of the effects of cannabis or cannabis components and the positive impact they have on social interactions,” they wrote.
