--- description: A study showed that marijuana-related Twitter accounts send messages to hundreds of thousands of followers each day, most younger than 19. title: Study: Pro-Pot Twitter Accounts Reach Hundreds of Thousands Of Youth image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt977c897747608979/698699c535ba6f5d90c02cf8/134099140.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [Living](/tag/time-section-living/) ## Living Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Study: Pro-Pot Twitter Accounts Reach Hundreds of Thousands Of Kids  by [Justin Worland](/author/justin-worland/)  ## Justin Worland Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Senior Correspondent Jun 28, 2014 12:17 PM CUT  Reefer madness Reefer madnessGetty Images  by [Justin Worland](/author/justin-worland/)  ## Justin Worland Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Senior Correspondent Jun 28, 2014 12:17 PM CUT In a trend decried as concerning by some, a [recent study](http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/27077.aspx "undefined") showed that marijuana-related Twitter accounts send messages to hundreds of thousands of followers each day, more than 70 percent of whom are the under the age of 19. “It is important to remember that \[marijuana\] remains a dangerous drug of abuse,” said Patricia A. Cavazos-Rehg, an assistant professor of psychiatry and a lead researcher on the study. “I’ve been studying what is influencing attitudes to change dramatically and where people may be getting messages about marijuana that are leading them to believe the drug is not hazardous.” The study, conducted by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and published online Friday in the _Journal of Medical Internet Research_, showed that 73 percent of followers of pro-weed Twitter accounts are 19 or younger and nearly 20 percent are 16 or younger. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/2935091/pot-twitter/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/2935091/pot-twitter/"},"headline":"Study: Pro-Pot Twitter Accounts Reach Hundreds of Thousands Of Kids","datePublished":"2014-06-28T12:17:56.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T08:55:34.628Z","description":"A study showed that marijuana-related Twitter accounts send messages to hundreds of thousands of followers each day, most younger than 19.","url":"https://time.com/2935091/pot-twitter/","keywords":["Living","Marijuana","Drugs"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt977c897747608979/698699c535ba6f5d90c02cf8/134099140.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Justin Worland","jobTitle":"Senior Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/justin-worland/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt977c897747608979/698699c535ba6f5d90c02cf8/134099140.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"marijuana","caption":"marijuana","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/2935091/pot-twitter/","name":"Study: Pro-Pot Twitter Accounts Reach Hundreds of Thousands Of Kids"}}]}] ```