Delivery Marijuana/Cannabis Torrevieja/Alicante/Benidorm
Marijuana users may experience distortions in their perception of time, often feeling like minutes can stretch out to several hours. We, in turn, are interested in how this phenomenon is scientifically substantiated?
Although cannabis, due to its long prohibition, is one of the least studied psychotropic drugs, studies on the topic of time dilation have been conducted and they confirm that such an effect takes place. Of course, we are not talking about hours, but rather about minutes and seconds.
“One of the most frequently felt effects of cannabis use by users is a distortion of time perception,” says Zerrin Atakan, a London psychiatrist who studied the impact of cannabis on human consciousness in detail back in 2012.
"To summarize the papers on the topic, 70% of subjects experienced a sense of time dilation, in other words, they felt that more time had passed than it actually had."
However, many of the studies have significant shortcomings in the form of small sample sizes. They did not take into account the degree of tolerance of the subjects, as well as different methods of delivering THC into the body, such as inhalation or oral administration, which significantly affect the effect of cannabis over time, and these are far from all the shortcomings of such studies.
A little later, but also in 2012, a team from the Yale School of Medicine tried to address these shortcomings in the scientific approach and dispel the fog over the question of how time changes under the influence of THC.
"I was fascinated by the observation that some psychotropic drugs can distort the experience of time, and that this phenomenon has not been well studied," says Deepak D'Souza, a professor of psychiatry at Yale University and the leader of the study. "I was particularly intrigued by the observation that some people who found the effects of cannabis unpleasant, and who also experienced time slowing down, had a particularly negative overall experience."
In their study, 44 people with varying levels of cannabis use went into a lab and completed two time perception tests before, during, and after taking doses of THC ranging from 0.015 mg/kg to 0.05 mg/kg or a placebo. The tests asked subjects to estimate how much time had passed in a short period of time (5 to 30 seconds) while they were distracted from counting by various simple secondary tasks on a computer.
The results showed that participants under the influence of THC increased their subjective time span by 25% compared to their sober state. Meanwhile, those who received a placebo showed no significant difference in their time estimation.
"Marijuana expands time, i.e. "five minutes pass in ten minutes," says D'Souza. "So the subjective experience is that time passes slowly, but this feeling can only happen if the internal clock speeds up."
THC speeds up all biorhythms of the body, and a person's internal clock runs faster, while he feels that external, objective time passes significantly slower. Often this effect is described by cannabis users as a thousand thoughts in their head, just a few real minutes. Although it feels like a person has been thinking for an eternity! Once sober, of course, the effect disappears.
The effect of speeding up the body's internal clock was confirmed by studies in 2001 on animals, when rats were given special chemicals that stimulate cannabinoid receptors and it was shown that the rodents experienced a slowdown in biorhythms, while blocking cannabinoid receptors led to an acceleration of biorhythms. Similar results were obtained in studies on monkeys.
What Factors Affect Time Distortion?
How exactly does cannabis act as a speed booster for our internal clocks?
“It’s a mystery,” and any hypotheses about the exact mechanism are speculative, says D’Souza. However, previous research has shown that a brain network called the thalamo-cortico-striatal circuit is integral to our perception of time. This set of brain regions is also known to contain a large number of cannabinoid receptors. So when THC from cannabis floods the brain, it can disrupt the normal functioning of these receptors, leading to a distorted perception of time.
Do these effects differ depending on how often you use cannabis?
Further analysis from D’Souza and his team showed that these time-distorting effects were particularly strong among those who rarely consumed THC, with the effect felt especially at medium and high doses of THC. Meanwhile, frequent users (2-3 times a week or more) did not experience significant effects on their perception of time, regardless of the amount of THC in their blood. Regular smokers were not susceptible to this effect.
The researchers offered several potential explanations for these findings. Although regular users do not become completely tolerant to the euphoric effects of THC, previous research has shown that regular use can dampen the effects of THC perception, as well as the sensitivity of our body’s receptors to THC. Thus, those who consistently and frequently use cannabis may eventually develop a biological tolerance to the drug’s effects on time perception.
**What are the implications of these effects? **
What’s the big deal if cannabis alters time perception within seconds? Why study this effect in such detail? “Keep in mind that timing is everything, and there are no activities that don’t require precise timing,” says Atakan.
“So if time is distorted by cannabis use, it could have important implications for normal functioning.” “Many fundamentals of human behavior are based on temporal judgments on the order of seconds to minutes,” adds D’Souza. “For example, deciding when to cross the street based on the perception of approaching traffic, or following the rhythm of a musical composition, or while preparing a meal in the kitchen.”
The Effects of Marijuana/Cannabis on Time
While the time-distorting effects of cannabis may seem trivial and can simply be used, for example, for creativity, for deeper immersion in a process, or as a strategy to squeeze extra time out of your day, there may be significant dangers associated with this effect. For example, a disrupted internal clock while driving or operating heavy machinery can lead to impaired decision-making, which can have consequences that are even fatal. While research has shed some light on the time-distorting effects of cannabis, we are still far from fully understanding its effects on time perception.
“There are not enough studies yet to provide more detailed information on this topic,” says Atakan. “More research using reliable methods is needed to draw conclusions about the exact effects of cannabis and its active compounds on time perception.”
In future tests, the researchers hope to use advanced imaging technology to learn more about how the brain circuits involved in timekeeping change their behavior under the influence of cannabis, and whether these distortion effects can be observed on the scale of milliseconds or minutes. But that future may be far away... or so it may seem if you're a little high today.