The relative ordering of the severity of abuse and dependence criteria in the present study differs from the corresponding severity levels found in previous research. The most comparable study (in terms of sample and design) was the Australian general population study of Teesson and colleagues (2002). The results of the present study generally agree with this earlier study that hazardous use and quit/control were at the milder end of the continuum; while activities given up, legal problems and neglecting roles were at the severe end of the continuum. Considering the other IRT studies with unrepresentative and/or treated samples, consistent with prior results, neglect of role (Langbucher et al., 2004) and legal problems (Martin et al., 2006; Gillespie et al., 2007) were among the most severe criteria assessed. Larger/longer, tolerance, time spent and social/interpersonal problem criteria fell within the intermediate range of the cannabis use disorder continuum, results also consistent with prior research (Langenbucher et al., 2004; Martin et al., 2006). In contrast, this study that found both quit/control and hazardous use criteria among the least severe criteria, while previous IRT
