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Bertsche, Rachel.”Teens and Marijuana: The Surprising Truth.” yahoo.com. Yahoo!, 15 July. 2015. Web. 15 July. 2015.

Rachel Bertsche is a writer for yahoo and the author of Teens and Marijuana: The Surprising Truth. In the researched article  published by yahoo.com recently, Bertsche inform us about how the legalization of marijuana has not affected the consumption of marijuana within the different age group by much. Pointedly, she mention the percentage of the consumption of marijuana from 2002 to 2013 and it was surprisingly consistent as the percentage hasn’t change much. She included the age of middle school kids and older  teen to back up her statement of how legalization of marijuana doesn’t mean that there will be a increase of younger adolescents.

According to Bertsche, over the last decade, marijuana has even lost its popularity among ages 12-14 and older teen.  In recent statistic posted about marijuana, the use of marijuana has drop from 6 percent in 2002 to 4.5 percent in 2013. For older teen it has decreases from 26 percent in 2002 to 22 percent in 2013. This study has proven that even with legalization of marijuana overdose is not a problem. In addition, marijuana is very accepted by medical group who support the legalization.

Bertsche article show support by mentioning the lead author Christopher Salas-Wright, assistant professor in the School of Social Work at the University of Texas at Austin, telling Yahoo Parents about the research they did that prove how there is no “dramatic spike national level” in the use of marijuana within the youth. She also mention laws changing across country have to deal with the decrease of use in marijuana. Bertsche mention Salas-Wright on how the following information is not enough to state what is going on in state like Colorado and Washington to keep a mutual opinion on the topic of marijuana. Then she also state other study to prove the no increase in marijuana use.

I found this article useful because I used to question the topic of marijuana and how come people think it might  become a problem. I  am personally very interested in reading and doing some more research on the impact of the drug as year pass in order to gain a better understanding of the subject. Other people in the class might find this essay useful as well, if they ever question the logic behind people thinking if it is good or bad.When thinking about how the policies that people make in the United States affect the consumption of marijuana within all age, I hope this could give you something to think about .

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6 Responses to RS1

  1. Shaniece!

    I question if the information Bertsche presents is reliable. In what states does the age of marijuana consumers remain consistent after legalization and how has this proven? I just wonder if the studies that mention the adolescents ages and experiences with marijuana are consistent with the areas that pot has been legalized. I find it hard to believe that more teens would not try weed if it was allowed.

  2. Topanga

    I am glad to finally see an article where the adolescent aspect is presented. It has long since been at the head of the legalization movement of how exactly young people will be affected by this decision. I can attest that many of my friends were like me in that we didn’t even touch marijuana, and I’m happy to finally see some stats that reflect that. Not every teenager is just teeming to try marijuana, and I believe your source did a good job in getting that across.

  3. Kyline Stephens

    I really like that this article is about the effect of marijuana on teenagers/young adults. Coming from a school where a large majority had tried marijuana at least once, the stats in this article that demonstrated the decrease in the use of marijuana for two different age groups was very interesting to see.

  4. Robert

    It’s interesting to find a view on how marijuana isn’t really that popular among teenagers. Of course, we can’t believe everything we read right away. After further studies back this up or possibly not we’ll be able to say without a doubt on whether or not legalization is swaying teens to smoke pot. In addition, it could be that programs that intend to fight drug use could actually be working now and maybe parents are being stricter with their kids.

  5. Kamran

    If Marijuana does become legal I think it will have a significant impact towards teenagers. In this summary it is interesting that parents will be more strict towards their children because they want to protect their kids. To see that Marijuana use within teenagers is no that popular is very astonishing.

  6. Henry Barragan

    Its funny, this is one of the few articles that I’ve read that actually takes account of smaller kids instead of adults. Its almost as if many articles kind of shun off the fact the kids smoke as well. However its also cool to see the less and less kids are choosing to do pot.

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