What happens in the brain when cannabis makes you anxious?

Cannabinoids may intensify anxiety by removing a natural brake on specific neurons in the brain’s fear center, particularly during stressful situations. In mice, shutting down those neurons sharply reduced cannabinoid-related anxious behavior. What happens in the brain when cannabis makes you anxious.

Scientists have pinpointed brain cells that may explain why cannabis can suddenly turn a calm experience into intense anxiety. Cannabinoids are a category of substances that includes THC, the main psychoactive ingredient in cannabis. To investigate how cannabinoids influence fear and anxiety, researchers exposed mice to a threatening smell derived from fox urine.

Before encountering the odor, the animals were given either a placebo or a synthetic cannabinoid drug. Mice that received the cannabinoid froze more frequently and spent less time exploring the predator scent.