Executive Functioning among Fine Art Students with and without Cannabis Use

Millions of humans have been using Cannabis for smoking since long. It has been very common among people for thousands of years. It is a derivative of the Hemp plant (Cannabis Sativa). It originally flourished in China and was used in India and the Middle East. Based on the 2003 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), an estimated 90.8 million adults (42.9%) aged 18 years or older had used marijuana at least once in their life time. Cannabis users who are engaged in creative endeavors report that usage of the substance facilitates executive functioning, While certain researches report that it causes deficit in executive functioning over prolonged period of use. The present study was designed to assess and compare the executive functioning among fine arts students measured by Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) and Stroop Test. It was a cross-sectional study carried out at RINPAS, Kanke, Ranchi. A total of sixty students attending Fine Arts courses were chosen as participants for the study through purposive sampling method. Among them thirty were cannabis users and rest thirty were non- users. Sample was taken from Fine Arts courses of educational institutions from West Bengal &Bihar. Results suggested that there is no significant relationship between cannabis and executive functioning deficit in Fine Arts students.