Marijuana has been legalized in two states, and its medicinal use has been authorized in several more. Many folks, especially youth, are beginning to see the drug as fairly benign; and a new study found that the legal acceptance of the drug would entice more youth to use it.

According to the study, published in the International Journal of Drug Policy, about 5.6 percent of low-risk high school seniors—those who’ve never used pot, have a strong ethical background and don’t have marijuana-using friends—would try the drug if it was legal. If those figures were added to the nearly 46 percent of seniors who already say they’ve used marijuana before, it would push the national usage rate to more than 50 percent.

However, a body of research suggests that the use of pot can come with serious consequences, and that’s especially true of teens. Because the teen brain is in a period of rapid development, mind-altering substances such as marijuana can have a huge impact.

Several studies show that teens who use marijuana once a week or more have trouble with their memories and a degradation in their problem-solving skills. Pot users tend to have a GPA a full point lower than their non-using peers. IQ tends to sink, too.

“We found that people who began using marijuana in their teenage years and then continued to use marijuana for many years lost about eight IQ points from childhood to adulthood,” says Madeline Meier, an author of a recent marijuana study conducted by Duke University. (National Public Radio, ScienceDaily)

Paul Asay has covered religion for The Washington Post, Christianity Today, Beliefnet.com and The (Colorado Springs) Gazette. He writes about culture for Plugged In and wrote the Batman book God on the Streets of Gotham (Tyndale). He lives in Colorado Springs with wife Wendy and his two children. Follow him on Twitter.