Everyday memory deficits in ecstasy-polydrug users

Montgomery, Catharine; Fisk, John E. · 2007 · Crossref

DOI: 10.1177/0269881107077220

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Summary

This study investigates the impact of recreational drug use, specifically ecstasy (MDMA) and cannabis, on "everyday" memory functioning, including prospective memory and cognitive failures. While previous research established that ecstasy impairs working memory, its effects on daily memory tasks—such as remembering future intentions or avoiding cognitive slips—remained unclear. The authors aimed to determine if ecstasy users exhibit deficits in these areas, whether these deficits are mediated by executive function, and if concurrent cannabis use accounts for observed impairments. The researchers recruited 43 ecstasy-polydrug users and 51 non-users from a university population. Participants completed self-report measures: the Cognitive Failures Questionnaire (CFQ), Everyday Memory Questionnaire (EMQ), and Prospective Memory Questionnaire (PMQ). To address potential metacognitive biases, friends or family members also completed the CFQ-for-others to provide an objective assessment of the participants' cognitive slips. Additionally, participants underwent tests for working memory capacity (computation span) and executive function (random letter generation). Statistical analyses included ANCOVA to control for covariates such as gender, alcohol consumption, working memory capacity, and cannabis use. Initial results showed that ecstasy-polydrug users reported significantly more cognitive failures and everyday memory lapses than non-users on the CFQ and EMQ. Friends also rated ecstasy users as having more cognitive slips. In prospective memory, ecstasy users performed worse on long-term episodic and internally cued subscales. However, these deficits were only slightly attenuated when controlling for working memory capacity, suggesting that executive function did not fully mediate the impairments. Crucially, when cannabis use variables were included as covariates, all significant differences between ecstasy users and non-users on the CFQ, EMQ, CFQ-for-others, and prospective memory measures were reduced to below statistical significance. Correlation analyses further revealed that cannabis use metrics were stronger predictors of everyday memory deficits than ecstasy use metrics. The study concludes that while ecstasy-polydrug users exhibit everyday memory deficits, these impairments are primarily attributable to concurrent cannabis use rather than ecstasy itself. The findings suggest that cannabis is a more significant predictor of cognitive slips and prospective memory failures in this population. Furthermore, the similarity between self-reported and other-reported cognitive failures indicates that ecstasy users are aware of their memory lapses, contradicting theories of a metacognitive deficit. The results highlight the importance of controlling for polydrug use, particularly cannabis, when assessing the cognitive effects of MDMA.

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• illicit drugs