The University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine did the study by researching listening habits of nearly 1,000 teens as well as analyzing the content of the top 794 songs from 2005, 2006 and 2007.

They found the average study participant listened to music 21.8 hours per week and were exposed to an estimated 40 pot references in music per day. Twelve percent admitted to being current marijuana users and 32 percent identified themselves as having previously smoked a bud or two, according to ScienceDaily.

Researchers also compared teens listening to songs sans any pot references to those whose favorite artists have three or more songs containing cannabis comments and discovered that the odds of members of the latter group using marijuana were doubled.

“Based on an analysis of survey data from 959 ninth-graders, we found that students who listen to music with the most references to marijuana are almost twice as likely to have used the drug than their peers whose musical tastes favor songs less focused on substance use, even after controlling for confounding factors,” lead author of the survey and Pitt’s School of Medicine assistant professor of medicine and pediatrics Dr. Brian Primack said.

“Interestingly, we also found that exposure to marijuana in music was not associated with other high-risk behaviors, such as excessive alcohol consumption. This suggests that there is a real link between marijuana lyrics and marijuana use.”

But there seems to be a chicken vs egg factor in the study, and researchers are not quite certain which element leads to the other.

“Although it may be that heavy exposure to music about marijuana causes marijuana smoking, it may also be that those who smoke marijuana seek out music with lyrics related to marijuana,” Primack said. “In either case, these results may help us develop more effective programs on drug education. For example, media literacy programs may help young people more accurately analyze and evaluate the marijuana-related messages they are likely to hear in popular music.”

The study – “Exposure To Cannabis In Popular Music and Cannabis Use Among Adolescents” – was published online and in the journal Addiction. For more information, please click here for the ScienceDaily article.