What’s Pain Got To Do With It?: Young Adults With and Without Chronic Pain Perceive Minimal Risks and Moderate Benefits from Cannabis Use

Many young adults experience chronic pain and given its wide availability and potential pain reducing properties, young adults may use cannabis to self-medicate for pain. However, little is known about young adult users’ perceptions of potential health risks and benefits of cannabis, and whether these perceptions differ by chronic pain status. As a part of a larger study, young adult recreational cannabis users (N=176, ages 18-29) who reported using at least once a week completed assessments of use frequency and perceived cannabis-related risks and benefits. The sample had a high proportion of participants who met criteria for chronic pain (51.1%). The majority of the sample reported using daily or multiple times daily (80.7%) with an average of 2.68 (SD=1.42) sessions per day across administration modes (e.g. smoking, edibles, tinctures). Participants answered questions about their lifetime chances of experiencing five cannabis-related risks (personal harm, negative health outcome, negative mental health outcome, harming someone else, increased pain) and benefits (personal benefit, positive health outcome, positive mental health outcome, benefitting someone else, decreased pain; 1=Very low to 7=Very high). Overall, young adult users perceived their risk to be very low (M=1.62, SD=.73) and 40.3% of the sample had an average risk score (combined across the five risk items) of 1.00, while only one participant reported an average risk above 4.00. In particular, participants reported a low lifetime chance of experiencing personal harm (M=1.51, SD=.90), harming someone else (M=1.20, SD=.58), or experiencing increased pain (M=1.24, SD=.74) due to their cannabis use. In contrast, young adult users perceived somewhat high chances of experiencing benefits related to their cannabis use (M=4.78, SD=1.46). In particular, participants perceived a high chance of experiencing reduced pain (M=5.88, SD=1.55), personal benefit (M=4.84, SD=1.86), and positive mental health outcomes (M=4.82, SD=1.77). There was no difference based on pain status on frequency of use, average daily sessions, or perceived risks, and only one difference in perceived benefits. Participants without chronic pain anticipated more personal benefit from cannabis use (M=5.15, SD=1.74) than those with chronic pain (M=4.53, SD=1.94, t(171)=2.21, p=.03). Overall, results suggest young adult recreational users perceive very low risks of their cannabis consumption and moderately high benefits, regardless of pain status. Looking at individual areas of potential risk and benefits may yield targets for future health education campaigns. For example, perceptions of low risk/high benefits regarding mental health outcomes may not be accurate for this heavy using sample.