21/11/2024
Ever had a joint and felt like you could understand people on a whole other level? Science would back you up. People who smoke w**d officially “have more empathy” than everyone else, according to a new study in the Journal of Neuroscience Research.
The researchers compared the brain activity of regular w**d smokers with the rest of us, and found that their anterior cingulate (the region linked to empathy) was particularly active. In effect, this made the stoners more capable sensing others’ feelings and better able to feel someone else’s emotional state within their own body.
Feeling the looove is pretty sweet, but experts believe the findings could have real-world implications for treating disorders that affect people’s social interactions, like social anxiety. One caveat here is the researchers note the Mexican w**d used in the study was "lower quality" than w**d in the US, containing just two to ten percent THC. As a result, w**d's effect on empathy could be different in the US.
However the results are used, no one’s in doubt that the world could do with a little more empathy. So let’s skin up and get along, man—it actually, scientifically, would help a lot.
📷: Getty Images