The Impact of Recreational Cannabis Markets on Cannabis Use Among Adolescents and Adults: A Synthetic Control Analysis

Abstract Objective: To assess the longer-term impacts of recreational cannabis markets on cannabis use among adolescents and adults across five U.S. states. Method: Drawing on state-level data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, this study uses a novel method of causal inference called the synthetic control method with staggered treatment adoption to estimate the pooled effect of recreational markets on prevalence and initiation of use in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, and Nevada. Three separate models were used