U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

NATIONAL HIGHWAY TRAFFIC SAFETY ADMINISTRATION

DOT HS 808 078 NOVEMBER 1993

MARIJUANA AND ACTUAL DRIVING PERFORMANCE

EFFECTS OF THC ON DRIVING PERFORMANCE

In summary, this program of research has shown that marijuana, when taken alone, produces a moderate degree of driving impairment which is related to the consumed THC dose. The impairment manifests itself mainly in the ability to maintain a steady lateral position on the road, but its magnitude is not exceptional in comparison with changes produced by many medicinal drugs and alcohol. Drivers under the influence of marijuana retain insight in their performance and will compensate where they can, for example, by slowing down or increasing effort. As a consequence, THC's adverse effects on driving performance appear relatively small. Still we can easily imagine situations where the influence of marijuana smoking might have an exceedingly dangerous effect; i.e., emergency situations which put high demands on the driver's information processing capacity, prolonged monotonous driving, and after THC has been taken with other drugs, especially alcohol. We therefore agree with Moskowitz' conclusion that "any situation in which safety both for self and others depends upon alertness and capability of control of man-machine interaction precludes the use of marijuana". However, the magnitude of marijuana's, relative to many other drugs', effects also justify Gieringer's (1988) conclusion that "marijuana impairment presents a real, but secondary, safety risk; and that alcohol is the leading drug-related accident risk factor". Of the many psychotropic drugs, licit and illicit, that are available and used by people who subsequently drive, marijuana may well be among the least harmful. Campaigns to discourage the use of marijuana by drivers are certainly warranted. But concentrating a campaign on marijuana alone may not be in proportion to the safety problem it causes.

DRUG PLASMA CONCENTRATIONS AND DRIVING PERFORMANCE

One of the program's objectives was to determine whether it is possible to predict driving impairment by plasma concentrations of THC and/or its metabolite, THC-COOH, in single samples. The answer is very clear: it is not. Plasma of drivers showing substantial impairment in these studies contained both high and low THC concentrations; and, drivers with high plasma concentrations showed substantial, but also no impairment, or even some improvement. The first driving study showed that impairment in the road tracking test was nearly the same in the first and second test, executed between 40-60 and 100-120 minutes after initiation of smoking, respectively. Plasma concentrations of THC and THC-COOH, however, were not the same during the tests: both were lower during the second than the first. The same pattern was found for ratings of perceived "high". It has been said that behavioral signs of intoxication, though small, outlast physiological and subjective reactions to THC (Reeve et al. 1983; Yesavage et al., 1985). to examine this hypothesis, future research should extend actual driving performance measurements to 4, 8, 16 and 24 hours after smoking. If driving impairment still occurs after THC disappears from plasma, it could mean that previous epidemiological research has underestimated the proportion of drivers who were driving under the influence of marijuana at the times their accidents occurred.

Mean speed was the only measure of driving performance that was even moderately related to plasma concentrations of the drug. Subjects with higher THC concentrations in plasma drove slower in the standard road tracking test (correlations varying from r = -.18 to r = -.72 between conditions). This effect might have been even more pronounced if the subjects had not been instructed to drive at a particular speed, and if they had had no feedback from the speedometer.

CONCLUSIONS

The major conclusions from the present program are summarized as follows:

* Current users of marijuana prefer THC doses of about 300 ug/kg to achieve their desired "high".

* It is possible to safely study the effects of marijuana on driving on highways or city streets in the presence of other traffic.

* Marijuana smoking impairs fundamental road tracking ability with the degree if impairment increasing as a function of the consumed THC dose.

* Marijuana smoking which delivers THC up to a 300 ug/kg dose slightly impairs the ability to maintain a constant headway while following another car.

* A low THC dose (100 ug/kg) does not impair driving ability in urban traffic to the same extent as a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.04g%.

* Drivers under the influence of marijuana tend to over-estimate the adverse effects of the drug on their driving quality and compensate when they can; e.g. by increasing effort to accomplish the task, increasing headway or slowing down, or a combination of these.

* Drivers under the influence of alcohol tend to under-estimate the adverse effects of the drug on their driving quality and do not invest compensatory effort.

* The maximum road tracking impairment after the highest THC dose (300 ug/kg) was within a range of effects produced by many commonly used medicinal drugs and less than that associated with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 0.08g% in previous studies employing the same test.

* It is not possible to conclude anything about a driver's impairment on the basis of his/her plasma concentrations of THC and THC-COOH determined in a single sample.