{"id":20781,"date":"2026-02-22T12:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T11:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/?p=20781"},"modified":"2026-07-04T17:57:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T16:57:10","slug":"study-adolescent-cannabis-use-linked-to-doubling-risk-of-psychotic-and-bipolar-disorders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/2026\/02\/study-adolescent-cannabis-use-linked-to-doubling-risk-of-psychotic-and-bipolar-disorders\/","title":{"rendered":"Study: Adolescent Cannabis Use Linked to Doubling Risk of Psychotic and Bipolar Disorders"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"header1\">\n<div class=\"header1-wrap -contain\">\n<div class=\"header1-main\">\n<div class=\"header1-mainwrap\">\n<h4 class=\"-mb:m4 -t:6\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\"><strong>Press Release by media@phi.org &#8211;\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><span style=\"color: #0000ff; font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;\">Oakland, CA &#8211; <\/span><strong style=\"color: #0000ff; font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;\"><time datetime=\"2026-02-20\">February 20, 2026<\/time><\/strong><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"wrap1 -pt:0\">\n<div class=\"wrap1-inner -contain\">\n<div class=\"-xw:3 -mx:a -mb:4\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<div class=\"-xw:4\">\n<p><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">Adolescents who use cannabis could face a significantly higher risk of developing serious psychiatric disorders by young adulthood, according to a large new study published today\u00a0in JAMA Health Forum. The longitudinal study followed 463,396 adolescents ages 13 to 17 through age 26 and found that past-year cannabis use during adolescence was associated with a significantly higher risk of incident psychotic (doubled), bipolar (doubled), depressive and anxiety disorders. The study was conducted by researchers from Kaiser Permanente, the Public Health Institute\u2019s Getting it Right from the Start, the University of California, San Francisco and the University of Southern California, and was funded by a grant from NIH\u2019s National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01DA0531920).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">The study analyzed electronic health record data from routine pediatric visits between 2016 and 2023. Cannabis use preceded psychiatric diagnoses by an average of 1.7 to 2.3 years. The study\u2019s longitudinal design strengthens evidence that adolescent cannabis exposure is a potential risk factor for developing mental illness.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">\u201cAs cannabis becomes more potent and aggressively marketed, this study indicates that adolescent cannabis use is associated with double the risk of incident psychotic and bipolar disorders, two of the most serious mental health conditions,\u201d said Lynn Silver, M.D., program director of the Getting it Right from the Start, a program of the Public Health Institute, and a study co-author.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"-xw:3 -mx:a -mb:4\" style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<div class=\"-xw:4\">\n<p><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">Cannabis is the most used illicit drug among U.S. adolescents. The\u00a0<em>Monitoring the Future<\/em>\u00a0study shows use rising with grade level \u2014 from about 8% in 8th grade to 26% in 12th grade \u2014 and according to the\u00a02024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, more than 10% of all U.S. teens aged 12 to 17 report past-year use. At the same time, average THC levels in California cannabis flower now exceed 20%, far higher than in previous decades, and concentrates can exceed 95% THC.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">Unlike many prior studies, the research examined any self-reported past-year cannabis use, with universal screening of teens during standard pediatric care, rather than focusing only on heavy use or cannabis use disorder.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">\u201cEven after accounting for prior mental health conditions and other substance use, adolescents who reported cannabis use had a substantially higher risk of developing psychiatric disorders \u2014 particularly psychotic and bipolar disorders,\u201d said Kelly Young-Wolff, Ph.D., lead author of the study and senior research scientist at the\u00a0Kaiser Permanente Division of Research.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"-xw:3 -mx:a -mb:4\">\n<div class=\"-xw:4\">\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">The study also found that cannabis use was more common among adolescents enrolled in Medicaid and those living in more socioeconomically deprived neighborhoods, raising concerns that expanding cannabis commercialization could exacerbate existing mental health disparities.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">SOURCE: https:\/\/www.phi.org\/press\/study-adolescent-cannabis-use-linked-to-doubling-risk-of-psychotic-and-bipolar-disorders\/<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; color: #0000ff;\">###<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Press Release by media@phi.org &#8211;\u00a0Oakland, CA &#8211; February 20, 2026 Adolescents who use cannabis could face a significantly higher risk of developing serious psychiatric disorders by young adulthood, according to a large new study published today\u00a0in JAMA Health Forum. The longitudinal study followed 463,396 adolescents ages 13 to 17 through age 26 and found that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73,144,63,30,68,120,36,19,61],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-addiction","category-age-related","category-brain-and-behaviour","category-cannabis-marijuana","category-drug-use-various-effects","category-mental-health","category-treatment-addiction","category-usa","category-youth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20781"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20783,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20781\/revisions\/20783"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}