Research Papers / The Psychological, Physiological, and Neurological effects of Marijuana and Cocaine Use in Humans. [34]

I'm writing a 3 page term paper, not bad because I'm still in second year. I'm sure it'll get worse.

So far I've managed an introduction/thesis. I need some criticism on what I've already written, and some suggestions on an outline for this paper, specifically how do you think I should approach what is essentially a really broad topic. Can you identify my thesis clearly? The topic(s) is apparent in the title. I know three pages is not hard, and I could bang it out if I didn't care so much about being neat and chronological. I appreciate your help.

The Psychological, Physiological, and Neurological effects of Marijuana and Cocaine Use in Humans.

Overview: The Physiological, and Neurological effects of Marijuana Use in Humans.

The United States has consistently been ranked among the highest in the world in terms of illegal drug use. But many contend that the problem is not confined to any normative boundaries such as race, nationality, or socioeconomic status. They posit that the use of psychoactive drugs is an inherent manifestation of a primal desire of humans to alter one's consciousness or state of mind. Others ascribe a different reason; they claim that recreational drug use is just a way to ease the burdens of work, relationships, and the hardships of life. Finally there are some who in explaining, point to the basic, underlying culprit in blame as having to do with a timeless question; what is the meaning and purpose in life? Because, they say, those who refute the question on the basis of its legitimacy are the very ones who are compelled to seek haven with drugs, away from the destitute recesses of their soul for a time. As of yet it doesn't appear that there will be any consensus on why people take mind altering drugs. There may very well be more than one reason, and for that matter the reasons may be overlapped and intertwined. Perhaps the answer varies depending on the profile of the user, or possibly the answer has not been conceived. What we are discussing here are the much debated, functional and principle reasoning mechanisms that govern people's emotive and perceptual, conscious or subconscious, attributions for why they take drugs, using a broad, anteceding approach. While a psychologist might be interested in and have something to add to that discussion, in lieu of any forthright answer, in the immediate term, there is a scholarly consensus based in decades of research, that illegal psychoactive drugs such as marijuana and cocaine, exact a toll on your health. Albeit begrudgingly, we must take a less insightful, more exigent route to understand and seek all that we can about the effects of these drugs, for our purposes marijuana and cocaine. How do marijuana and cocaine exert their effects, what is the nature of their effects, and how do they cause some people to become dependent or addicted to them?

The psychoactive drug Cannabis, commonly known today as marijuana, green, or pot, is derived from the Cannabis Sativa plant. Routes of administration include smoking, ingestion, and rarely, rectal insertion of a solution including oil and water. Tetrahydrocannibanol (THC), the active ingredient in marijuana, is several times more pervasive, and rapidly absorbed (in seconds) in the blood of someone who has smoked marijuana, as opposed to eating or drinking it, wherein it may take an hour to feel the effects. It is responsible for the acute, physiological effects experienced shortly after use, and a myriad of effects on the heart, brain, and lungs which may become more pronounced over long term or chronic use. It has been shown that after mere minutes smoking marijuana, a person's heart rate increases typically anywhere from 20-50%, and may sometimes double. An increase in heart rate, tachycardia is not believed to be a direct effect of marijuana on the heart; rather it is an indirect result of changes which occur in the autonomic nerves that preside over the regulation of heart rate. Other acute effects frequently reported are the reddening or prominence of bloodshot eyes, which can be attributed to a swelling of the conjunctivas blood vessels, and dry mouth, due to reduced salivation. The user will also, often times experience a shift in appetite and a ravenous urge to eat or drink. Euphoria and elation predominate initially, followed by a period of lingering drowsiness, which some users may try to delay or subvert by taking repeated doses. Performance is adversely affected as there may be difficulty concentrating, remembering, or coordinating and balancing one's movements; this is consistent with an overall decline in motor skills. Some people report being detached and to some extent cognizant of a dissolution in deed and perception known as depersonalization, which is, among the more variable effects that not all of, or even most people might experience, including altered sense of time, anxiety, and sharper vision coupled with visual distortions. While the effects described here occur often enough in people that use marijuana to be relevant and repeated with regularity, with the exception of a few, because of people's varying experiences due to common factors such as dose, prior usage history, experience, THC content, and some would even argue setting and expectations although research hasn't proven it, they don't occur in all users or in the vast majority of times following use.

Cannabinoid receptors are sites in the brain that correspond to the endogenous neurotransmitter anandamide. Tetrahydrocannibanol acts by attaching to cannabinoid receptors on nerve cells in multiple regions of the brain. Those regions of the brain with an abundance of cannabinoid receptors are therefore more prone to the influence of THC, and as a result the more consistent and apparent effects of marijuana use mostly have to do with functions that are regulated by areas of the brain most susceptible to THC. Marijuana has attained a good bit of notoriety in schools across the United States, partly because it is the most widely used illegal drug among teenagers, but also because its widespread use permeates into the classroom during school, and on the football field and other sports arenas after school. These areas have come to be emblematic of some of the most troublesome effects and shortcomings of marijuana use. Instructors and school officials may become suspicious of marijuana or drug use in the case of a student whose grades have declined considerably in conjunction with unusual behavior such as sleeping in class, displaying inattention, or missing homework assignments and being inconsistent. When THC in marijuana attaches to cannabinoid receptors in various regions of the brain, one area affected heavily is the Hippocampus, which is responsible for learning and memory vital to success in school. Other regions also influenced considerably include the Cerebellum, responsible for body movement and coordination, the Cerebral Cortex, agent of higher cognitive functions, the Nucleus Accumbens, a reward center, and the Basal Ganglia, also involved in movement control. Researchers and others alike tend to be especially interested in the Nucleus Accumbens, an aggregation of neurons in the forebrain thought to have a strong bearing on reward, pleasure, and addiction among other things. People who use marijuana may not be aware of it, but the euphoria and bliss that they seek occur in tandem with increased levels of dopamine in the Nucleus Accumbens, a finding that is also characteristic of most every other recreational drug. The Hippocampus is another region of the brain that draws a lot of attention with regard to marijuana use. Neurons in the Hippocampus control memory and related learning functions, so as people get older and lose neurons their ability to remember things decreases. THC accelerates this process by aging neuron cells prematurely, which might hasten the imminence of their death and impair memory in the user. The persistence of this effect, although not at this time thought to be permanent, is longer than the period of intoxication and probably less inclined to wear off with more chronic use.

If someone smokes cigarettes for a week and never again, we can conclude with reasonable certainty that it won't affect their long term health prognosis. However, if the same person smokes for 30 years, bravely assuming that they are not already suffering from, most likely they are at an increased risk for lung cancer, heart disease, and other ailments that only develop over long term use. Much in the same way, research today indicates that using marijuana in the short term does not have any permanent adverse effect in humans. Less certain though, is whether or not long term Cannabis use is to the detriment of the user. There are several purported long term effects of marijuana use that have been studied; some are more credible than others. These effects pertain to the individual who has used marijuana daily, heavily, for many, many years. As to which factor would have a greater bearing on our definition of a heavy, long term user, frequency of use has precedent over the quantity of dose. Research has provided considerable evidence that cannabinoids in marijuana, particularly THC, induce immunological changes in rodent animals in the cell-mediated and humeral immune system. The method used to show impaired cell-mediated immune system function is a decreased lymphocyte response in reaction to T-cell mitogens. To demonstrate an impaired humeral immune system the same method is used, except that the muted reaction is in response to B-cell mitogens, T-cells being characteristic of the cell mediated immune system, and B-cells being characteristic of the humeral immune system. Due to these changes, the result is an increased risk of bacterial or viral infection. The relevance of these findings is mitigated however, because the doses required in order to incur these changes have been very high, which adds to the stand alone problem of applying results in rodents to humans. Another obvious concern is that the evidence does not address the possibility that tolerance would develop in humans, perhaps making these findings irrelevant altogether. In the limited human experimental and clinical data, there is unresolved, likely evidence that THC impairs cell-mediated immune system function. What to make of studies that have implicated THC in suppressed immune system function is uncertain because the expectation is that reduced immune system function would result in an increase of infectious diseases, yet there has been no epidemiological outbreak of diseases among chronic heavy cannabis users. One study of HIV positive gay men suggests that their continued use of marijuana did not put them at an increased risk of worsening to AIDS. Considering the extent of marijuana use in western society, reconciled with the fact that there has been no epidemiological outbreak of infectious diseases among users, the evidence is in favor of it being unlikely that smoking cannabis leads to major dysfunction in the immune system. It is not as easy to rule out marijuana use in minor immune system impairment that cannot be as easily detected, but would instead take the form of an unsuspecting cold or other common, bacterial or viral illness.

Healthy young adults who use Cannabis do not show any prolonged strain on their cardiovascular system, as the effect is comparable to common stress. People with preexisting heart conditions such as atherosclerosis however, appear to be at a special risk and are advised to abstain from cannabis use. In chronic heavy users who smoke cannabis, the effects on the respiratory system are similar to a person who smokes tobacco. Most of the health problems in the respiratory system mutual to tobacco and chronic heavy marijuana use arise because of the method of administration, smoking, not because of anything that can be isolated as a byproduct of the cannabinoids. Coughing, wheezing, and sputum production, all which are symptoms of chronic bronchitis, can result from chronic heavy cannabis use. Additionally, chronic bronchitis and cancer of the respiratory tract are probably a more common occurrence in heavy chronic marijuana users for the same reason they are more common in tobacco smokers. A preexisting respiratory condition such as asthma might be exacerbated by smoking cannabis; the same concern with a preexisting heart condition, and the reason why people with respiratory illnesses are advised not to smoke cannabis. Evidence indicates that chronic heavy marijuana use causes microscopic changes in lung tissue, like those that occur prior to lung cancer. At this time it is debated whether or not cannabis smoke causes cancer, with certain studies indicating it does, and others, very recently showing otherwise, that it does not. Although it remains to be proven definitively, the cancer-marijuana link probably presents the most ominous risk in the perception of a casual cannabis user who does not smoke tobacco, and plausibly even in users that smoke cannabis and tobacco, out of fear that the risks may be mounting to cause for a reconsideration of their habits. It's worth noting that even if it is proven beyond any doubt that smoking cannabis causes cancer in chronic heavy users, the results would by and large be insignificant to the typical, infrequent user, but ostensibly still persuade some to discontinue cannabis use, or use cannabis less frequently, and others not to begin.