The number of 16- to 24-year-olds using marijuana has fallen by half since the 1990s, but what's behind this? change?
Weed, pot, dope… whatever you call it, cannabis has been the most commonly used illicit drug in the UK for decades, and 16 to 24-year-olds have long been the generation most heavily using it. But the overall decline in young people's drug use (from 21% in the year to March 2020 to 18% in 2023) is being attributed primarily to a decline in cannabis use, raising the question of whether cannabis is really losing its influence.
according to Government DataYouth cannabis use peaked at 28% in 1997 and has steadily declined since then, hitting an all-time low of 13% in 2013. The latest data, for the year ending March 2023, shows that cannabis use among 16-24 year olds has fallen 4%, while cannabis use among adults aged 16-59 has remained stable at 8%.
It's worth noting here that government data on drug use isn't always accurate, and the actual numbers of young people using cannabis are likely much higher, especially among certain subsets of the population. For example, a small survey conducted in 2020 by harm reduction organizations NeuroSight and Drugsand.me found that 86% of students ages 18 to 23 said they used cannabis, 29% daily or nearly daily, 25% multiple times a week, and 9% used it at least once a week.
It's important to note that not everyone is comfortable disclosing their illegal drug use as part of a government investigation, so it's important to take the data (and any conclusions drawn from it) with a pinch of salt. That said, anecdotally, some researchers teeth Things are really changing when it comes to young people and marijuana. “The intuition is that younger generations are going to be much more moderate in their drug and alcohol use than older generations,” says Paul North, director of the Drug Policy Website and a harm reduction expert. Volte Face“When I speak at schools and universities I find that the young people I speak to are not very enthusiastic about cannabis, or even drugs in general.”
For North, a 4 percent drop in use is significant enough to indicate that young people are using marijuana less, but why? North thinks it has to do with a growing curiosity about sober marijuana use (in 2019, more than a quarter of 16-24 year olds had never drunk alcohol). “One of the things people are observing about Gen Z is that they're not going out and partying as much,” North says. “My sense is that they're more health-conscious and mindful of what they put into their bodies than they were before.”
Jack*, 22, a freelancer from Sheffield, who asked to remain anonymous, has cut down on his cannabis use in the last year after deciding to take a more mindful approach to his consumption. “I started smoking cannabis at 17 and it quickly became a habit,” they told Dazed. They initially started using cannabis for fun and relaxation, but sometimes it became a bit of a crutch. “Sometimes it was good for my health, sometimes it wasn't,” they explain. “It depended on how bad things were going in my life at the time. When I was doing well I was more mindful of when and why I used cannabis, but when I wasn't it was so easy to just smoke a cigarette and blow off my problems, and for me that wasn't healthy.”
They continue: “It was affecting my sleep. It was becoming addictive, it was starting to affect my work, and I began to realize that things I had been doing for fun were becoming habitual.”
@emibaus13 24 days of #quittingweed with my sobriety guru @Ran and a bit about why I quit smoking since lots of people have asked =]But more on that in another video! 🫶🏼 Sleep is still awful but I'm surviving like Johnny Utah Boy #quittingsmoking #abstenence ♬ Howl's Moving Castle – The Merry-go-round of Life – Vitamin String Quartet
As Jack's friends began to think more critically about their drug and alcohol use, they felt it would be a good idea for them to do the same. “We don't want to be dependent on substances,” they say. “We wanted to get back to the way we felt when we first started smoking and have fun again – not mindlessly, but as a little treat. I still smoke, but only once a week, max. Ideally I'd smoke less, but I enjoy it so I've never felt the need to quit completely.”
Several people Dazed spoke to for this article said they don't smoke at all, or at least rarely. One was a 22-year-old graduate student from North Wales who said he doesn't smoke for religious reasons, and another said he's simply not interested. “I've never enjoyed the feeling of smoking and I don't like the smell, so for me it's a waste of money,” they told Dazed. “If it was legal and sold in stores, I might be more inclined to buy it as food, especially if my friends were doing it. But still, I don't smoke it.” Laura, 23, a student from South Wales, told Dazed that she doesn't consume cannabis more than four times a year simply because it makes her feel nauseous. “I'm more of a drinker,” she says. Another student from North Wales said she doesn't consume cannabis because it doesn't fit into her schedule. “I don't have a problem with ingesting it, but I don't have a problem with the cannabis itself,” they say.
While the majority of young people don't use cannabis regularly, North believes there's likely a generation that would have been more likely to start using if they hadn't come of age during lockdown. “On average, there's going to be a demographic that didn't have the opportunity to go out and socialise during lockdown and come across drugs and use them,” he says. “And having lost that time, they may be on a path to not using drugs at all.” North also cites the cost of living as a possible factor, which echoes Jack's belief that people would likely have smoked more if it weren't for the cost.
“I found that the young people I spoke to weren’t very interested in cannabis, or even drugs in general. […] Meters“My sense is that they're a little more health conscious and paying attention to what they put in their bodies.” —Paul North
But the pandemic has also led some to smoke cannabis more frequently than before. Charlie, a 23-year-old technology graduate from Manchester, started smoking as a hobby when he was 16, but it wasn't until he started university that he started smoking once a week. “I was smoking four or five times a week in my second year of university, but when I took a year off to be with my mum during lockdown, I started smoking every day.” Charlie moved back home during the pandemic and worked as a chef in a restaurant. “I would smoke after work every night to calm my nerves after a busy shift,” he recalls. From there, he continued to smoke daily for about three years, until he started his first job as a graduate in 2023.
“During the summer between my master's degree and starting work, I would just sit at home and smoke, so I was smoking up to seven grams a week,” he says. “It was pretty bad. When I got to work, I wanted to cut down, so I tried to only smoke on weekends, but the cravings would hit me so hard that I would often hold myself back. I ended up going back to about four or five days a week.”
While the concept of dependence is a contentious one in the cannabis community, many habitual smokers will admit that trying to quit is difficult (withdrawal symptoms can last up to 30 days, and include loss of appetite, anxiety, lack of sleep, night sweats, nightmares and tremors, though symptoms vary from person to person), and regular use doesn't necessarily mean someone wants to quit.
Charlie plans to cut back on smoking, at least on weekends, but the change hasn't happened yet. Why? He says he doesn't know. “Willpower, addiction, habit. There are lots of reasons, but a big reason is just habit and the fact that me and my roommate are just as bad at it as each other.”
And of course, Dazed has heard plenty of stories from regular cannabis users who have no interest in quitting anytime soon. One student from Salford said his cannabis use was “Smoking makes life easier to cope with and helps ease depression,” he says, while another student, Carla, from Manchester, says after dealing with long hours and the pressures of adulthood “smoking is the best way to bring me back to reality and calm me down”.
Whether or not marijuana use is truly on the decline, many young people seem to view it as something to be used sparingly, or at least cautiously, much like alcohol. As more of us reach adulthood, only time will tell how our attitudes about health and wellness will affect our future drug use.
