Legalized marijuana: Language-associated knowledge of laws and risk perceptions among Latinos.

ABSTRACT

This study examines the extent to which knowledge of recreational marijuana laws, health effects, and perceptions of risk for marijuana use differ between Spanish- and English-speaking Latino survey respondents from a registry of Colorado adults. Spanish-speaking Latino respondents (n = 47) had less accurate knowledge of laws permitting use of marijuana than English-speaking Latino respondents (n = 154), while reporting greater agreement with negative health effects and higher perception of risk associated with marijuana use. The results suggest that efforts to communicate health and informational messaging to the public about legalized marijuana should consider linguistic variations when tailoring campaigns for Latino audiences.