鈥淲rite drunk, edit sober,鈥� goes the famous saying that is often 鈥� probably apocryphally 鈥� attributed to Ernest Hemingway. It is debatable whether that is sound advice with any substance, but when that notion is applied to cannabis use, it is almost certainly a bad idea.
Research into the connection between cannabis and creativity has found no evidence that the drug boosts ingenuity. But it does make people who use it feel good, which in turn makes them perceive their ideas 鈥� and others鈥� 鈥� as more creative. 鈥淓verything seems better when you鈥檙e in a better mood,鈥� says at the University of Washington in Seattle.
In a study published earlier this year, Barnes and his colleagues tested the link between getting high and thinking creatively. In this context, they defined 鈥渃reativity鈥� as 鈥渢he production of useful and novel ideas鈥� 鈥� which allowed them to quantify the variable. The researchers ran volunteers through a series of take-home tests designed to measure innovative thinking and then asked the participants to evaluate their own performance, along with the performance of their fellow test-takers. Some of the participants were sober, others were under the influence of cannabis.
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Barnes and his team found that, when under the influence of a modest amount of cannabis, people tended to rank their own THC-fuelled ideas as 鈥� even when they weren鈥檛, according to the researchers鈥� analysis of the same ideas. Volunteers under the influence also tended to rank other peoples鈥� ideas as more creative across the board. But they were more critical when asked to evaluate ideas while sober. The researchers chalk this finding up to the drug鈥檚 feel-good effects.
The science of cannabis
As the use of marijuana and its compounds rises around the world, 快猫短视频 explores the latest research on the medical potential of cannabis, how it is grown and its environmental impact, the way cannabis affects our bodies and minds and what the marijuana of the future will look like.
鈥淐annabis increases your feelings of joviality,鈥� says Barnes. 鈥淎nd those feelings of joviality then colour your perception of other things.鈥�
However, Barnes cautions, this doesn鈥檛 mean that cannabis has no effect on creativity. 鈥淚t could be that there are offsetting beneficial and detrimental effects, which average out to zero,鈥� he says.
Other researchers have uncovered similar results. at Washington State University studies the effects of cannabis on the brain, and two of her papers have dealt specifically with creativity. In one, published in 2017, she and her co-author found that while sober compared to non-users. However, Cuttler identified a potential confounding variable: an individual鈥檚 openness to new experiences 鈥� which has been . When the team controlled for this factor, the correlation between creativity and cannabis disappeared.
鈥淪o it鈥檚 not necessarily that being a cannabis user makes you more creative,鈥� says Cuttler. 鈥淚t was just that people who are more open to experiences, and therefore more creative, were also more likely to use cannabis.鈥�
Additionally, in a 2021 study, she and her colleagues found that people who use cannabis regularly tend to while intoxicated, but those ideas are less feasible than the ones they dream up when sober.
In the future, both Cuttler and Barnes would like to investigate the link between cannabis and creativity under controlled laboratory settings. This would allow them to test different dosages and strains, as well as observe participants directly. 鈥淭he next step for me would be to look at the acute effects,鈥� Cuttler says. 鈥淚 think that would be cool.鈥�
