A Day in the Life: A Daily Diary Examination of Marijuana Motives and Protective Behavioral Strategies Among College Student Marijuana Users

Abstract

This study examined marijuana-use motives and protective behavioral strategies (PBS) as within- and between-subject predictors of marijuana-related outcomes. Furthermore, we explored differences between a specific marijuana-related event (i.e., 4/20) compared with typical weekend/weekday use. Forty-three college student marijuana users (31 females) completed daily surveys for 12 days (April 15–April 26, 2016). Four motives (coping, conformity, enhancement, and social) were associated with more negative consequences within-subjects. Enhancement and conformity motives were also associated with a higher number of use sessions, and expansion motives were associated with higher subjective high. Marijuana PBS use (total score) was associated with fewer sessions and lower subjective high within-subjects. Social motives were higher, whereas PBS use and coping motives were lower on 4/20 compared with other days. Our findings support PBS and certain use motives as promising intervention targets for college student marijuana users.

Motives for Substance Use in Daily Life: A Systematic Review of Studies Using Ecological Momentary Assessment

“…The only study, to our knowledge, examining daily associations between situations and motives for cannabis use found that weekends were associated with a greater likelihood of reporting social motives but were not associated with endorsement of any other motive subtype (Pearson et al, 2020). Furthermore, social motives were more commonly reported on April 20—also known as 4/20, a “cannabis holiday”—and coping motives were less commonly reported on this date.…”

“…Only one study in the present review reported ICC estimates for cannabis use. In this analysis, the within-persons level of analysis accounted for 86% of the variance in conformity motives, 43% of the variance in social motives, and approximately 25% of the variance in enhancement, coping, and expansion motives (Pearson et al, 2020).…”

“…As with alcohol use, conformity motives appear to be uncommon for cannabis use (Buckner et al, 2015;Shrier & Scherer, 2014). Likewise, two studies examining mean motive strength across cannabis use days found that enhancement motives had the highest average strength, followed by coping and expansion motives, social motives, and finally, conformity motives (Bonar et al, 2017;Pearson et al, 2020).…”

“…The single highest loading item from each subscale (as reported in Simons et al, 1998); participants responded on a 4-point scale representing the strength of each motive on the previous night (Bonar et al, 2017) • Two highest loading items from each subscale (as reported in Simons et al, 1998); participants responded on a visual analog scale from 0 to 100 representing the strength of each motive in the previous 24 hr (Pearson et al, 2020) • Participants chose the main reason they were about to use cannabis and the main reason they just used cannabis (for pleasure, to cope, to conform, to be more social, to expand et al, 1974) • Thirty-four-item measure assessing typical motives for cigarette smoking across 6 subtypes (psychosocial/negative affect, indulgent, sensorimotor, stimulation, addictive, and automatic)…”

The rise and fall of substance use during treatment: Applying recency and expectancy principles to daily substance use patterns.

“…Substance use behavior is a good proxy for substance use motivation, although there may be situations when a patient has strong motivation to use substances, but it is extremely impractical for them to do so (e.g., during inpatient treatment or incarceration). However, in a typical outpatient setting where patients are not physically restricted from obtaining substances, increased substance use motivation will presumably correlate strongly with actual substance use, as in other segments of the population (Benitez & Goldman, 2019; Monk & Heim, 2014; Pearson et al, 2020; Serre et al, 2015). Therefore, the occurrence of substance use behavior can be assumed to reflect increased substance use motivation in a typical outpatient treatment sample.…”