Social Anxiety and Cannabis Cravings: The Influences of Parent Injunctive Norms and Tension Reduction Expectancies

Abstract

Objectives-Socially anxious cannabis users are influenced by cannabis expectancies and normative perceptions. The present study examines the influence of psychosocial factors on cannabis use vulnerability factors as the result of interactions between norms perceptions, social anxiety, and expectancies.Methods-Participants were 149 (36.2% female) current cannabis users aged 18-36 (M=21.01, SD=3.09). Hierarchical multiple regressions were employed to investigate the predictive value of the social anxiety X injunctive norms X expectancies interaction on cannabis cravings.Results-A three-way interaction emerged in the prediction of cannabis cravings. Simple slopes analyses showed that among individuals with perceptions of greater parent approval of cannabis use (higher injunctive norms), social anxiety was associated with greater cannabis craving when expectancies regarding relaxation and tension reduction were greater (t=2.54, p=.01, β=1.12).Conclusions-Among cannabis users with perceptions of greater injunctive norms, social anxiety was associated with greater cannabis craving when tension reduction expectancies were greater. However, social anxiety was unrelated to cannabis craving when expectances were low. This suggests that cannabis craving among socially anxious adults was greatest when cannabis use was viewed as acceptable and expected to reduce tension, and highlights the importance of considering norms, expectancies, and social anxiety in understanding cannabis-related behaviors.

Assessing Marijuana Use, Anxiety, and Academic Performance Among College Students

“…Again, the results here were not significant; the receipt of formal anxiety treatment did not mitigate marijuana use among anxiety‐laden students. This lack of statistical significance appears contrary to prior research suggesting that marijuana is used to cope with anxiety (Buckner et al, ; Foster et al, ; Zvolensky, Schmidt, Bernstein, & Keough, ). Other research has found that one's perceived ability to handle stress may moderate the relationship between marijuana use problems and social anxiety (Buckner, Schmidt, Bobadilla, & Taylor, ), whereas distress tolerance has been shown to be negatively related to coping motives for marijuana use (Semcho et al, ).…”

“…As a secondary analysis, the current study was unable to assess for marijuana use problems, which may be uniquely related to anxiety and use of marijuana as a coping mechanism. Additionally, further studies have proposed various other factors that may complicate the pattern between marijuana use and anxiety, including parental attitudes and tension reduction expectancies (Foster, Ecker, Zvolensky, & Buckner, 2015), an individual's temperament in terms of harm avoidance versus novelty seeking (Grunberg, Cordova, Bidwell, & Ito, 2015), distress tolerance (Semcho et al, 2016), and behavioral avoidance (Buckner, Zvolensky, Farris, & Hogan, 2014). Thus, the relationship between marijuana use and anxiety remains quite complex, and these findings certainly add further complexity to our current understanding of this dynamic.…”

Consumo de Canábis: craving e a relação com ansiedade, stresse e depressão

“…Aquando da recolha de dados, nas conversas tidas com os consumidores foi muito frequente constatar que estes relatavam fumar canábis para reduzir a tensão. Esta constatação reforça a interpretação a favor do argumento de que um dos factores motivadores e desencadeadores do uso da canábis é lidar com e reduzir o efeito negativo das situações com que se confrontam (Foster, Ecker, Zvolensky, & Buckner, 2015).…”

“…Os resultados deste estudo podem contribuir para uma melhor compreensão das variáveis psicológicas associadas ao consumo de canábis e da relação entre elas, contribuindo, assim, para o desenvolvimento de estudos mais aprofundados e específicos, por forma a serem desenvolvidas abordagens e intervenções específicas para esta problemática. Importa não perder de vista que estudos anteriores sugerem que quase um terço dos indivíduos que satisfazem os critérios de diagnóstico para os transtornos de abuso de substâncias também satisfaz os critérios para os transtornos de ansiedade social (Foster et al, 2015).…”

Parents’ Cannabis-Related Attitudes and Emerging Adult Offspring Cannabis Use: Testing the Mediating Effect of Perceived Parental Approval

“…Parents convey approval or disapproval of substance use, either consciously or not (Petraitis et al, 1995). Given that parents are important role models, their approval/disapproval has reinforcing value and consequently is a robust predictor of offspring cannabis use, across both early adolescence and into emerging adulthood (Bailey et al, 2016;Foster et al, 2015;Foster et al, 2016;LaBrie et al, 2010a;Napper et al, 2015). Yet, most of this work is done with college samples and is cross-sectional in nature and only one study has explicitly tested this mechanistic pathway.…”