Why teenagers should steer clear of cannabis

Neuropsychopharmacology
Yasmin Hurd, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York
Karolinska Institute, Sweden
University of Maastricht, Netherlands

Adolescents' use of marijuana may increase the risk of heroin addiction later in life, a new study suggests. Researchers say the work adds to "overwhelming" evidence that people under 21 should not use marijuana because of the risk of damaging the developing brain.

The idea that smoking cannabis increases the user's chance of going on to take harder drugs such as heroin is highly contentious. Some dub cannabis a “gateway” drug, arguing that peer pressure and exposure to drug dealers will tempt users to escalate their drug use. Others insist that smoking cannabis is unrelated to further drug use.

Now research in rats suggests that using marijuana reduces future sensitivity to opioids, which makes people more vulnerable to heroin addiction later in life. It does so by altering the brain chemistry of marijuana users, say the researchers.

“Adolescents in particular should never take cannabis – it’s far too risky because the brain areas essential for behaviour and cognitive functioning are still developing and are very sensitive to drug exposure,” says Jasmin Hurd, who led the study at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

But Hurd acknowledges that most people who use cannabis begin in their teens. A recent survey reported that as many as 20% of 16-year-olds in the US and Europe had illegally used cannabis in the previous month.

"Teenage" rats

In order to explore how the adolescent use of cannabis affects later drug use, Hurd and colleagues set up an experiment in rats aimed to mirror human use as closely as possible.

In the first part of the trial, six “teenage” rats were given a small dose of THC – the active chemical in cannabis – every three days between the ages of 28 and 49 days, which is the equivalent of human ages 12 to 18. The amount of THC given was roughly equivalent to a human smoking one joint every three days, Hurd explains. A control group of six rats did not receive THC.

One week after the first part was completed, catheters were inserted in all 12 of the adult rats and they were able to self-administer heroin by pushing a lever.

“At first, all the rats behaved the same and began to self-administer heroin frequently,” says Hurd. “But after a while, they stabilised their daily intake at a certain level. We saw that the ones that had been on THC as teenagers stabilised their intake at a much higher level than the others – they appeared to be less sensitive to the effects of heroin. And this continued throughout their lives.”

Hurd says reduced sensitivity to the heroin means the rats take larger doses, which has been shown to increase the risk of addiction.

Drug memory

The researchers then examined specific brain cells in the rats, including the opioid and cannabinoid receptors. They found that the rats that had been given THC during adolescence had a significantly altered opioid system in the area associated with reward and positive emotions. This is also the area linked to addiction.

“These are very specific changes and they are long-lasting, so the brain may ‘remember’ past cannabis experimentation and be vulnerable to harder drugs later in life,” Hurd says.

Neurologist Jim van Os, a cannabis expert at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands told New Scientist the research was a welcome addition to our understanding of how cannabis affects the adolescent brain.

“The issue of cross-sensitisation of cannabis/opioid receptors has been a controversial one, but these findings show the drug’s damaging effects on the reward structures of the brain,” van Oshe says. “There is now overwhelming evidence that nobody in the brain’s developmental stage – under the age of 21 – should use cannabis.”

The research appears in the online edition of Neuropsychopharmacology.

didn't people once say cigarettes were a gateway drug too? Some believe also believe that caffiene is a gateway drug. Where does this nonsense end?

I already suspected that my brain was altered as a teen and that I'd require a LOT of heroin if I ever tried it. That's precisely why I got a good education and a job that paid really well. I've saved my money and invested wisely. Now, since heroin is my #1 goal in life, I feel totally comfortable that I can begin at any time.

Alcohol is by far more harmful than cannabis, especially for teens. Focus energy where it does the most good: legalize cannabis and educate people about the evils of alcohol.

I agree, and I've seen what alcohol does first-hand. Virtually everyone I know had fun with weed as teens, and now they're the pillars of our communities. While it's probably true that he who takes heroin also tried pot first (probably also alcohol and perhaps cigarettes, too), it certainly doesn't follow that everyone who smokes pot moves on to heroin.

I couldn't agree more with that rationality. Alcohol and hard drugs wreck lifes by way of mental, emotional and physical destruction of a person.
But if this study turns out to hold true for humans too, then it's worth its merits. I wonder how they handle this age issue in places like Copenhagen and Amsterdam, where cannabis comsumption is not ilegal.

In most animal studies of abusable drugs, the animals are given very high doses in order to speed things up and to make the findings unequivocal. Usually the blood level of a drug in a self-dosing human will be many times lower than in the animal study.

References please Rick. As much as I respect your knowledge of the physical sciences I know that you are not a pharmacologist, and you would usually be the first to take anecdotes with a pinch of salt.

But also note that related to the conditioning dose, very high doses were not given:

.......In the first part of the trial, six “teenage” rats were given a small dose of THC – the active chemical in cannabis – every three days between the ages of 28 and 49 days, which is the equivalent of human ages 12 to 18. The amount of THC given was roughly equivalent to a human smoking one joint every three days, Hurd explains.....

Thereafter the heroin doses were self administered (not externally dosed) and your statement is thus incorrect with regard to both THC and heroin in this study.

I agree entirely with your comments on alcohol. As a moderate imbiber (you already know what of), I gain great benefits, but the societal/health problems are well documented. Hence my dismay at the UK's new "open all hours" drinking policy that is only adding to the already serious incidence of liver disease and to the decay of city centres, that are no more than public urinals after dark on most nights.

Anyway, back to my Scotch (I've run out of Irish) before a nice moderate family orientated Friday evening of drinking (Rioja) and eating. Well, summer doesn't last long here and we have to make the best of every minute! Have a nice weekend.

It sounds like a valid study.

So much propaganda bullshit. Alcohol and Nicotine are way (edit)more harmful drugs...

what are you talking about? Alcohol and nicotine don't cause you to hallucinate in the way that cannabis can. I know some ppl just get stoned and chill out, especially for chronic users, but for others when they're first experimenting, it's very hallucinogenic.

Correction:
So much propaganda bullshit. Alcohol and Nicotine are way MORE HARMFUL drugs...

what's harmful about nicotine, besides being addictive and being used as insecticide?

heh maybe agree to disagree and say all three should be avoided?

$3.00/package, high lung and/or throat cancer death rates, very offensive to non-smokers, lots of unintentional fire hazards, and worst of all: powerful lobbyist who keep the truth about its short and long term effects as secret as possible so that it may remain legal.

Does it mean it's harmful? Ur brainwashed like most of our society, I know by experience that's it's way less harmful on the long AND shor-term than nicotine and alcohol. When ur drunk u do so much more stupid stuff that u'll feel bad about later, what about liver damage? I'm sorry but we should keep teens away from alcohol (wich to my eyes is comparable to an "hard" drug) and nicotine (totally useless and addictive) and legalize marijuana. Go smoke a joint and then get drunk and let's compare the damage/intoxication/addictiveness.

"A single glass of wine will impair your driving more than smoking a joint. And under certain test conditions, the complex way alcohol and cannabis combine to affect driving behaviour suggests that someone who has taken both may drive less recklessly than a person who is simply drunk."
New Scientist March 2002 (linked)

experience tells otherwise. Just another reason to remain sceptical of the New Scientist

Linking cannabis to heroin use in any way is ridiculous.
Our kids crave sugar like a drug and get hyped up because of it.
Our kids will see us drunk at one point or another, and smoking.
Their teenage years and childhood make them curious of other things that they can ingest, and so alcohol and cigarettes are the first testers. Once the everyday drugs are not a novelty anymore, either the behaviour will stop or change form.

What about gamblers and shopaholics, aren't they more prone to addictive behaviours?

Nothing on this planet should be illegal. Crimes against people should stay illegal, but what you do to yourself should remain free. The problem is our own government has used misinformation historically and this just makes the population lose confidence.

Actually "gateway drug" like u said is probably tobacco and alcohol...

Many comments above relate to anecdotal or personal, unsubstantiated experiences, whereas the article by Yasmin Hurd has conclusions derived from an scientifically accepted study. The issues raised above on alcohol and nicotine have no bearing on the findings of the Hurd study. I had hoped for some critical comments on the Hurd findings and not biased comments, or rather "beefs" trying to justify their drug-taking by certain responders. We try to maintain a scientific bias on BrainMeta. Sometimes this is difficult. It is also useful if we keep to the point. Sometimes this is also difficult. Few comments above have stated anything useful about the Hurd investigation, that yielded important results that deserve serious discussion.

Its rats not people and the focus of the research is on the most complex part of a human - the brain.
We have no idea why the rats that had THC in their "teens" self-administered more heroin, it is possible they were used to a "hit" and so didn't exhibit as much fear as the non-THC rats. Also the more heroin initially taken, the more heroin will be subsequently needed, thereby the heroin use may have grown exponentially in the rats that were used to being high.



Firstly I agree that it certain areas of the brain displaying change when exposed to THC is interesting, the research is probably sound. However what I disagree with is the black and white conclusions hinted at in this research. We don't know enough about the brain to say one way or another, despite what the research appears to look like. Permanently affecting "Areas" of the brain is a little vague for me. Until I see every millimeter of the brain accounted for and all its processes understood, I will never take these studies seriously.

"They found that the rats that had been given THC during adolescence had a significantly altered opioid system in the area associated with reward and positive emotions" If the rats enjoyed the experience, wouldn't this make sense? Enjoyment, escapism and selfishness create addiction, and if a person has an addictive personality, which we all do to some extent, the desires will be channeled into other activities like gambling or sexual perversions. We can't erradicate addictions, not without restructuring society and our methods.

So this study saying that cannabis use before the age of 21 can permanently "alter" the way your brain emtionally rewards itself, and make you self-administer more heroin than people who didn't smoke cannabis. The larger the dosing of heroin, the more likely addiction is to form.

I can agree with that research, sure. However the research is completely pointless in a reality setting. Below is a list of drugs and a taboo level I've just made up on the spot. (Ive left out psychedelics)

Drug-Taboo lvl
sugar-0
caffiene-0
alcohol-1
nicotine-2
cannabis-5
amphetamine-10
cocaine-20
heroin-40
crack cocaine-40

I've taken the "taboo values" from my own experience of the observed levels of ignorance and misunderstanding.

Who knows of anyone that has taken up heroin without touching any of the lesser taboo substances?
Who starts at heroin/crack and works backwards?
Anyone who tries cannabis is more likely to do more heroin and so become more easily addicted, but to get to heroin almost EVERYONE will have smoked cannabis, and I believe a huge proportion of those people will have done so in their teens. So will this information stop the problem? No.

You mention that most of the posts in this topic are unsubstantiated experiences, well I believe all experiences are personal and so are unable to be substantiated. Since I didn't partake in the experiment, and have deep distrust of these kind of studies because they usually have political motives behind them, ill choose my own reality based knowledge over the research above.

As for "beefs" trying to justify their drug-taking, I personally don't have to justify myself to anyone on this matter. I posted my experience of reality, something that this research lacks. Anything enjoyable that happens to you will "rewire" your brain in some way, big news...

How many teenagers do you know that will think about possible future heroin use when they're about to smoke their first joint?

Hopefully this post will satisfy your requirements for replies and maybe guide the matter into areas that you want to chat about instead of leaving it open and then tearing into the replies.

LD wrote:

"what are you talking about? Alcohol and nicotine don't cause you to hallucinate in the way that cannabis can."

Sorry, but that is totally incorrect. Have you ever heard of the DT's also known as delirium tremlins? It is a condition brought on by excessive alcohol use that does cause many frightening hallucinations. Hundreds of thousands of people die every year from alcohol abuse. No one has ever died directly from a cannabis overdose. Not only acute alcohol intoxication kills but also does harm in the long term from lesser doses such as by cirrhosis of the liver. It has been implicated in causing cancer and increasing the risk of many diseases.

Nicotine kills probably even more people every year than alcohol. I don't want to get into a big side track on those two drugs. Do a search and you will find all the studies you want. No one has died as a direct result of cannabis use. Case closed.

I think it should be restricted to young people but made legal for adults.

It'S actually easier and cheaper for kids to get nice colorful Methamphetamine and MDMA pills with nice logos on them than Tobacco and Alcohol ... The war on drugs is so much shit... imagine what it will be in a few years if it goes on like that O_o

Wow, so much to say to all this...

Okay, so first of all, I dont' know that I buy that because weed consumption in the "teen" years increases later tolerance to heroin that it also leads to the DESIRE for heroin or heroin ADDICTION. You have to try something initially for it to matter at all whether it as a greater or lesser effect on you, and this study didn't prove that the rats were more likely to want to try heroin or that people are. In addiction, just because the weed rats required more heroin to get high, it doesn't mean they were addicted or more likely to become addicted. It sounds to me like ALL the rats became addicted. And personally, if something has less of an effect on me (so it costs more for me to get high and I have to consume more) I'm going to be less likely to continue using it and therefore be less likely to become addicted. So basically what this proved to me is that ingesting weed as a teenager will lead to you having a higher tolerance for heroin later in life... so what? You might be less likely to die of an overdose later on that you would have been otherwise. That seems like a good thing to me.

Another problem I'm having is what the comment about how cigarettes and alcohol weren't as bad because they dont' cause you to hallucinate and weed does. This is also very problematic. Not only does alcohol often cause people to hallucinate (and weed rarely does) but there is an inherant assumption here: that hallucinating is bad. Personally I don't hallucinate when I smoke OR drink but I think it would be a better thing for someone to hallucinate a little bit than to become angry and become violent. The latter is a tendency associated with drinking and that I have yet to find with marijuana.

Finally, I wanted to address the scientific bias. In this post, I have actually stayed fairly scientific and pointed out real methodological flaws with generalizing the results. I then used logic to address the second issue. I did not use much purely personal experience, although I did mention it to support my arguments. However, I do feel that personal experience can be a powerful pool in experiencing and learning about reality. I am also very familar with research and scientific design (I am currently conducting my own research on mindfulness and attention) and I am aware of its many flaws and shortcomings. Not least of these is its vulnerability to bias and the ability to skew results and statistics. Science can also often see reality only in a very limited and often artificial context. For these reasons and many more, I often give as much or more credence to real human experience than to data produced in some lab.

Enough of my ranting.

According to some credible literature I have read on the subject, the hallucinations caused by alcohol withdrawl (delerium tremens, or DTs) are real hallucinations and can be very frightening for the victim because he does not know he is hallucinating. On the other hand, the hallucinations caused by cannabis smoking are actually pseudo-hallucinations because the smoker knows they are due to the drug's effect, and can be enjoyable, such as in seeing animals in the clouds or a face in the Moon. Such imagery is also a part of normal relaxed recreational mind enjoyment. Psychiatrists say that people unable to see imagery in inkblots, for example, are abnormal.

Exactly. I fail to see why hallucinations are necessarily a bad thing. It all depends on what you are hallucinating and how you feel about it.

I never said hallucinations were a bad thing. I agree that the creative mind, an active imagination, and hallucinations are inter-related. What I said was that nicotine and alcohol are not harder drugs than cannabis. Only the die-hard cannabis user will object to this and go on the defensive, and their opinion is expected to be overly biased. I'm trying to be somewhat objective here. The thing about nicotine killing ppl is crap. Lung disease from tar and carcinogens in cigarette smoke might kill ppl, but nicotine itself doesn't. Nicotine stimulates receptors in the brain and enhances attention and hippocampal theta. Nicotine itself does not cause hallucinations, nor does moderate alcohol consumption. Sudden withdrawal from alcohol in alcoholics is a different matter that, while interesting to note, is not really relevant as an argument that alcohol is hallucinogenic, since if you allow that, then probably stuff like sudden chocolate withdrawal in chocolate addicts also falls into that category of hallucinogenic substances.

Okay, point taken. But alcohol DOES kill people. I guess it all depends on how you define "hard." My point is that I don't think hallucinating qualities make a drug "harder." I would have to say that how hard a drug is really is largely determined by how the society perceives the drug. Social stigma plays more into it than biological facts. But if you want to base it on something biological or scientific, then you need to define your term. If marijuana is harder, or ever if alcohol ISN'T harder than marijuana, then you have to explain exactly what harder means to you. For me, I'd say that alcohol is harder because it kills. Also much more addiction potential. Even if you are going to say marijuana is addictive, which in some ways I'll grant you it can be, both nicotine and alcohol are much more addictive. So alcohol kills, alcohol and nicotine are more addictive than marijuana.... I'm having a hard time seeing how marijuana can be described as the harder drug. If your definition of harder is that if causes you to hallucinate when used (not just when experiencing withdraw) then I suppose maybe you're right, or at least I won't argue the point, but I think its a weak definition of hard drugs.


By the way, I'm really just arguing because like I said, none of this really matters to me. To me "hard" is a social construct and THAT'S the real reason people think marijuana is the harder drug.

To be honest, calling cannabis an hallucinogen is stretching it quite a way. Cannabis is addictive and causes grumpy-ass behaviour on withdrawal of higher THC levels, however you wont hallucinate from the withdrawal.

I never really liked alcohol anyway except very rarely and cannot understand how people can become alcoholics.

Well, people can definitely have hallucinations while on cannabis... it may not be the average experience but it happens. Not from withdraw that I know of but from the actual experience of the substance...

I remember one day on my first few times I smoked cannabis. I smoked a little more than usually and it was a full blown psychedelic experience at the level of LSD...

Seriously, Darksanity? I'm amazed. My friends who have smoked have never seen anything like the effects of LSD. The first time I smoked was just hilarious and euphoric, but I had no hallucinations then, nor on any weed-only occasion since.


Yeesh, lucid, that's pretty dismissive!

If I was to provide personal anecdotes, my experience would corroborate New Scientist's suggestion. I felt much less safe driving when drunk than I did driving when stoned, though lately I'm very rarely either.


I'm afraid I must object to your argument here (as well as your pre-emptive ad hominem) and suggest that nicotine and alcohol are both 'harder' than cannabis (and I don't smoke much weed at all these days).

Nicotine and alcohol are both more addictive than THC, and cause more severe withdrawal symptoms. Also, contrary to your earlier assertion, nicotine alone can kill - it is a potent neurotoxin. So can alcohol - either directly through poisoning, or indirectly by making someone do reckless things, which is disturbingly frequent. By contrast, THC is virtually harmless: there are no recorded incidents of someone dying from THC poisoning.

That said, I make no arguments against cannabis use being mentally harmful, which I think it is. It demotivates people and depresses them emotionally and intellectually, making them less able to function socially. It is also thought to exacerbate pre-existing tendencies to schizophrenia, or to induce it straight. So I agree that teens generally ought to be cautious.

[/quote]

Nicotine and alcohol are both more addictive than THC, and cause more severe withdrawal symptoms. Also, contrary to your earlier assertion, nicotine alone can kill - it is a potent neurotoxin. So can alcohol - either directly through poisoning, or indirectly by making someone do reckless things, which is disturbingly frequent. By contrast, THC is virtually harmless: there are no recorded incidents of someone dying from THC poisoning.

That said, I make no arguments against cannabis use being mentally harmful, which I think it is. It demotivates people and depresses them emotionally and intellectually, making them less able to function socially. It is also thought to exacerbate pre-existing tendencies to schizophrenia, or to induce it straight. So I agree that teens generally ought to be cautious.
[/quote]

You did forget to mention that while under the influence of THC, slowed reaction time could pose some sort of danger to the subject or others, but I agree that even still THC is much less physically harmful comparitively speaking.

Did you folks see the article recently that shows the ingredients in cannabis help prevent alzheimers? Another study shows it reduces the symptoms of that disease.

Really? For some reason, that seems ironic. Is there a site where I could view this article?

I'm not sure which article you mean xanadu, but I saw once that THC is the exact chemical opposite of something which causes alzheimers or some other disease of the brain. Maybe its the same information being reporteda again?

MAY help prevent.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4286435.stm

The active ingredient in marijuana may stall decline from Alzheimer's disease, research suggests.

Scientists showed a synthetic version of the compound may reduce inflammation associated with Alzheimer's and thus help to prevent mental decline.

They hope the cannabinoid may be used to developed new drug therapies.

The research, by Madrid's Complutense University and the Cajal Institute, is published in the Journal of Neuroscience.


We would warn the public against taking marijuana as a way of preventing Alzheimer's
Dr Susanne Sorensen
The scientists first compared the brain tissue of patients who died from Alzheimer's disease with that of healthy people who had died at a similar age.

They looked closely at brain cell receptors to which cannabinoids bind, allowing their effects to be felt.

They also studied structures called microglia, which activate the brain's immune response.

Microglia collect near the plaque deposits associated with Alzheimer's disease and, when active, cause inflammation.

The researchers found a dramatically reduced functioning of cannabinoid receptors in diseased brain tissue.

This was an indication that patients had lost the capacity to experience cannabinoids' protective effects.

The next step was to test the effect of cannabinoids on rats injected with the amyloid protein that forms Alzheimer's plaques.

Those animals who were also given a dose of a cannabinoid performed much better in tests of their mental functioning.

The researchers found that the presence of amyloid protein in the rats' brains activated immune cells.

However, rats that also received the cannabinoid showed no sign of microglia activation.

Using cell cultures, the researchers confirmed that cannabinoids counteracted the activation of microglia and thus reduced inflammation.

Drug target

Researcher Dr Maria de Ceballos said: "These findings that cannabinoids work both to prevent inflammation and to protect the brain may set the stage for their use as a therapeutic approach for Alzheimer's disease."

Dr Susanne Sorensen, head of research at the Alzheimer's Society, said: "This is important research because it provides another piece of the jigsaw puzzle on the workings of the brain.

"There is no cure for Alzheimer's disease, so the identification of another target for drug development is extremely welcome.

"The Alzheimer's Society looks forward to seeing further research being carried out on cannabinoid receptors as drug targets for Alzheimer's disease but would warn the public against taking marijuana as a way of preventing Alzheimer's.

"It is now generally recognised that as well as providing a 'high', long-term use of marijuana can also lead to depression in many individuals."

Different receptors

Harriet Millward, of the Alzheimer's Research Trust, said there were two main types of cannabinoid receptor, CR1 and CR2.

"It is CR1 that produces most of the effects of marijuana, including the harmful ones.

"If it is possible to make drugs that act only on CR2, as suggested by the authors of this study, they might mimic the positive effects of cannabinoids without the damaging ones of marijuana.

"However, this is a fairly new field of research and producing such selective drugs is not an easy task.

"There is also no evidence yet that cannabinoid-based drugs can slow the decline in human Alzheimer's patients."

LOL!

lol no one thinks marijuana is the harder drug...It is just the government, because they have no way to make money if marijuana is legal--same reason stevia is a "dietary supplement"

This is very misleading since almost anything is neurotoxic at sufficiently high levels. Nicotine activates nicotinic acetylcholine receptors which are distributed throughout the brain and are thought to be largely pre-synaptic receptors that function to increase neurotransmitter release.

In other words, nicotine potentiates neurotransmitter release and thus may enhance brain function.

Nicotine has been successfully used to alleviate some of the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, along with cholinesterase inhibitors.

I know ppl who have tried nicotine, alcohol, and cannabis in varying dosages and only the cannabis caused them to hallucinate like madmen. And so there is no way you can say that cannabis is safer than nicotine or alcohol in moderate dosages.

so THC is used to alleviate the inflammation of microglia and Nicotine is used to alleviate some of the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, along with cholinesterase inhibitors.
with that said, is it better to get addictions for preventing AD????
maybe the answer is YES but there are a lot of f@#€ing side effects!
please dear italy let the THC become legal and put the damn taxes on it!

HAHA I couldn't agree more~ The only probelm is that if marijuana is legal, everyone could just grow it themselves and there is no money to be made for the government...And if marijuana was legal there wouldn't be any wars--why would the government want that

Oh and instead of using nicotine, why not use galantamine? Nonadictive and has many of the same effects right?

A possible mechanism for the rat study on THC and heroin...

Most drugs of abuse and rewarding situations raise dopamine levels either directly or indirectly (through incentive motivational effects). As cannabis has numerous interactions with the dopaminergic system, it is possible then that this system has become sensitised towards incentive stimuli through the administration of THC. This would manifest later on as increased consumption of other rewarding stimuli and in this study they used heroin which could be easily replaced with alcohol, methamphetamine, cocaine and probably even sucrose consumption. I would also think that administration of the aforementioned substances (possibly including sucrose) would also lead to the increased consumption of heroin.

So my understanding of the situation is that administration of one rewarding substance will increase consumption of a second seemingly unrelated substance. And looking at some animal data this will increase until a set point is reached well above a natural rewarding threshold. This fits with the fact that many users who prefer heroin will use methamphetamine during heroin droughts to stave of craving.

Although this only takes into account the dopaminergic system...

What are people's views on the usefulness of hallucinating?

Sure hasn't helped me much... Recently I have been having little psychedelic flash backs (especially when looking at hotel room celings).

True hallucinations, as associated with schizophrenia, are, of course, counterproductive, leading the victim away from reality.

The visual and other effects associated with consciousness expanding drugs are more properly called pseudo hallucinations because the drug utilizer is aware that his unusual experience is the product of the drug. There is some debate within the utilizer community as to the utility of (pseudo) hallucinations: some partisans maintain they are a distraction from the benefits of the experience, while others maintain they are a necessary part of it, something to be gotten through before finally "coming on."

Hallucinating can have healing and psychological relief capabilities when used in a medical context. Milton Erickson hypnotically induced hallicinations to relieve subjects of pain that otherwise required morphine.