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Time reports on how U.S. Drug Enforcement’s Administration (DEA) ruled on Friday that marijuana has “no accepted medical use” and should therefore remain illegal under federal law — regardless of conflicting state legislation allowing medical marijuana and despite hundreds of studies and centuries of medical practice attesting to the drug’s benefits.

The judgment came in response to a 2002 petition by supporters of medical marijuana, which called on the government to reclassify cannabis, which is currently a Schedule I drug — like heroin, illegal for all uses — and to place it in Schedule III, IV or V, which would allow for common medical uses.

The DEA ruled that marijuana has “no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States,” has a “high potential for abuse,” and “lacks an acceptable level of safety for use even under medical supervision.”

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Source: Time

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Marijuana is the most prevalent illicit drug used by teenagers and adults around the world. Nearly a third of high school students in the United States report smoking it, and most high schoolers say they have access to the drug.

To many people, smoking pot is no big deal. They cite reasons such as: “it isn’t dangerous or addictive” and “everybody is doing it.”

Denise Walker, co-director of the University of Washington’s Innovative Programs Research Group, disagrees.

“It’s not a risk-free drug,” she said. “Lots of people who use it do so without problems. But there are others who use it regularly – almost daily – and want to stop but aren’t sure how.” [continue reading…]

Can graphic images persuade people to make lasting changes to their behavior? The answer, according to  psychological research, is probably not.

Dr. Howard Leventhal, the Board of Governors Professor of Health Psychology at Rutgers, agrees that photos are in fact stronger than words, but that images may not lead to long-term behavioral effects. Leventhal states, “You don’t need a lot of threat to get something to happen as long as the threat is associated with a clear, simple plan of action. For cigarettes, it’s more complicated, you may need a more potent level to get people to change.”

Leventhal continues, “The problem that I had with [the new Food and Drug Administration cigarette warning labels is that] it isn’t as clear to me as it might be whether there was a specific plan for action that was linked to the images. In other words, you get people motivated but if you don’t provide some concrete and specific directions for behavior, they might habituate to the threat and go ahead and do it anyway.”

These extremely graphic images, which include rotting teeth, blackened lungs, and a dead body, are intended to deter people from smoking. Paul Slovic, professor of psychology at the University of Oregon, says these warning labels may “change the aura and image about smoking for young people who haven’t yet started to smoke or are in the early stages.” But these images are unlikely to change the behavior of current smokers.

In addition, according to Carol Tavris, social psychologist and author of a recent book on cognitive dissonance, “What we know from decades of social psychological research is that fear backfires.”

Source: Association for Psychological Science