increases in both cannabis use and cannabis use disorder (CUD) in African-Americans have been reported, with cannabis use increasing from 4.7% to 12.7% and CUD from 1.8% to 4.6% between 2001 and 2013 (Hasin et al., 2015). Furthermore, CUD and cannabis use–particularly early initiation of cannabis use–is linked to a host of deleterious outcomes including psychiatric symptoms (i.e., anxiety and depression) and use of other drugs (Compton et al., 2011; Davis et al., 2013; Hall, 2009; Patton et al., 2002; Volkow et al., 2014). Taken together, these data point to the importance of considering cannabis initiation and CUD as a public health concern and provide a compelling rationale for developing gender- and race-specific etiological models of cannabis involvement.
