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Q. Is it just me, or do kids who use marijuana compromise their mental ability?

A. It's not just you! A recent study (April, 2002) shows heavy marijuana use (5 or more joints a week) can actually lower your IQ. Short-term effects on mental acuity have be common knowledge for some time, but this is the first study to compare IQ scores of participants before they started smoking pot (ages 9-12) with their current scores (ages 17-20). Among heavy users who currently smoked more than five joints a week, IQ scores dropped by an average of 4.1 points.

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