Summary
Alcohol and marijuana, both widely used socially as recreational drugs, produce changes in vision and vision performance which last for some hours after drinking or smoking. In our study, experiments were conducted double-masked using a placebo in a replicated Latin square design. In general, the oculomotor changes were more apparent than sensory changes and alcohol invariably produced larger vision deficits than marijuana for “equivalent” levels of social use of the drug.
The major oculomotor findings are 1) an increase in tonic convergence (more with alcohol), 2) the maximum velocity of smooth eye tracking is decreased by alcohol and not by marijuana, 3) optokinetic nystagmus and peripheral gaze nystagmus are affected by both drugs but more by alcohol, 4) pupil size is reduced by marijuana and unaffected by alcohol. The major visual sensory findings are 1) no change in visual acuity with either drug, 2) a marked reduction in the acuity of moving objects by alcohol and to a lesser extent by marijuana, 3) a prolonged glare recovery associated with either drug, 4) small reductions in color discrimination similar to those seen in mild protonomaly, and 5) a decrease in visual search time for alcohol but not for marijuana.
In general, combined doses of alcohol and marijuana failed to support a simple additive model for drug activity. All observed changes reached a maximum within 2 hours and lasted for up to 6 hours after drug ingestion, and most of the changes are dose related.
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Adams, A.J. (1978). Acute Effects of Alcohol and Marijuana on Vision. In: Cool, S.J., Smith, E.L. (eds) Frontiers in Visual Science. Springer Series in Optical Sciences, vol 8. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-35397-3_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-35397-3_12
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