Study Finds Caffeine Makes Marijuana More Enjoyable

Scientists believe they’ve discovered why caffeine and marijuana go so well together while researching how marijuana interacts with other drugs in the brain. Researchers found that caffeine reinforces THC’s effects, potentially making it more pleasurable.

To study THC and caffeine, researchers gave monkeys the ability to get high from marijuana with the pull of a lever, which triggered an intravenous release of THC from a surgically implanted device.

After familiarizing the monkeys with the consequences of pulling the lever, they gave them doses of MSX-3, a water-soluble analog of caffeine. With 1 mg/kg of MSX-3 (equivalent to less than half a cup of coffee for the average person) the monkeys pulled the lever less often than they did without MSX-3. When given 3 mg/kg (equivalent to one or more cups of coffee) of MSX-3 the monkeys pulled the lever even less. The caffeine-analog made it so that the monkeys desired less THC, presumably implying that caffeine enhanced the effects from THC.

It appears that two natural substances (caffeine and THC) that humans have consumed for eons are not only reasonably safe, but actually compliment each other too.