Daily associations with cannabis use and sleep quality in anxious cannabis users

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Cannabis is increasingly used to self-treat anxiety and related sleep problems, without clear evidence of either supporting or refuting its anxiolytic or sleep aid effects. In addition, different forms of cannabis and primary cannabinoids ∆9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD) have differing pharmacological effects.

Methods

Thirty days of daily data on sleep quality and cannabis use were collected in individuals who use cannabis for mild-to-moderate anxiety (n = 347; 36% male, 64% female; mean age = 33 years). Participants self-reported both the form (flower or edible) and the ratio of THC to CBD in the cannabis used during the observation period.

Results

Individuals who reported cannabis use on a particular day also reported better sleep quality the following night. Moderation analyses showed that better perceived sleep after cannabis use days was stronger for respondents with higher baseline affective symptoms. Further, respondents who used cannabis edibles with high CBD concentration reported the highest perceived quality of sleep.

Conclusions

Among individuals with affective symptoms, naturalistic use of cannabis was associated with better sleep quality, particularly for those using edible and CBD dominant products.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Paige Phillips, Alexander Napolitan, Leigha Larsen, and Marco Ortiz Torres for their contributions and the participants for taking part in the study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author, CB. The data are not publicly available due to their containing information that could compromise the privacy of research participants.

ClinicalTrials.Gov registration

NCT03491384

Author Contributions

CB: Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Supervision, Visualization, Writing – original draft, review, & editing

SS: Formal Analysis, Methodology, Resources, Software, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, review & editing

RMW: Data curation, Resources, Visualization, Software, Writing – original draft, review & editing

LH: Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Software, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, review & editing

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this study was provided by R01DA04413 (PI: Bidwell) and F31AA029632 (PI: Martin-Willett)