Study shows adderall use on campus

As students continue to tackle midterm examinations, many will seek refuge in University libraries to study so they can obtain the best grade possible.

But one study shows that some of these students may use Adderall, a drug used to help those with attention deficit disorder, commonly dispersed among college students across the country, with or without a prescription.

Director for the Center of Alcohol Studies Robert Pandina conducted a study in 2007 focusing on the use of Adderall among University students who did not have a prescription for the medicine.

Georgia Kouzoukas, a former University student working with the Center of Alcohol Studies, and Daniel Ogilvie, a University professor of psychology, also conducted the study alongside Pandina.

The study asked 122 students if they ever used the drug Adderall, which can help control hyperactivity and impulse, and why they would use it and compared it to the use of other drugs such as marijuana and alcohol.

According to the study, 11.9 percent of the students said they used Adderall while nearly 90 percent reported use of alcohol.

Although the study was conducted in 2007, Lisa Laitman, director of the Alcohol and Other Drug Assistance Program for Students, said the use of Adderall among college students is still a national phenomenon not unique to the University.

"This is a problem that exists on a lot of college campuses and there are basically two or three different ways college students use Adderall. One is a sort of performance enhancement, [which] would mean that someone is simply using Adderall to study better and stay up," she said. "The other way, obviously, is to abuse the drug to get high."

The study also asked those students who used Adderall why they needed the ADD medication and found that academic enhancement was the main motivator.

Students also said they used the medication for social reasons such as to enjoy a party or just to have fun. The study also showed a relationship between Adderall and having a grade point average above or below 3.0. Students using the medication had lower GPAs, according to the study.

The study also showed 75.4 percent of students find the use of non-prescribed Adderall as socially acceptable while 93.2 percent find the use of marijuana as socially acceptable.

The students who fall into these two categories usually do not have a legitimate prescription for Adderall, Laitman said. But she said this does not mean students who do have a prescription are not at fault.

"There is a third group of people who may have a prescription. They may have ADD but they are not using it appropriately or they are selling it to friends," she said. "It is actually a smaller group."

Because many students who take Adderall do not have a prescription, they do not know the risks of taking a stimulant drug, which can harm those with heart conditions or other health risks, Laitman said.

"So that actually is a problem that has emerged with college students. They may not know they have a heart condition until they try Adderall," she said. "When you use Adderall at levels that are higher than what is prescribed, you could also increase a number of these risk factors."

Many students use the medication to produce euphoric effects, which is not a healthy decision, Laitman said.

"They get high when they crush it and snort it. It could have a lot of effects. It depends on how much a person is taking and there are also physical conditions," she said. "That is actually one of the reasons people end up in hospitals."

When a student uses Adderall in such a way, it can produce significant amounts of negative side effects, Laitman said. But she added that such a circumstance is not common.

"Many people who are going to use Adderall to study are not going to have these negative side effects. But it does happen," she said. "I do think there have been increases in hospital admissions for overdoses and for these negative side effects that come from using Adderall when you don't have a prescription."

As the study shows, many students take the ADD medication in hopes of boosting academic performance. Laitman said data from other studies do not support this notion, and studies that have been done on students who use Adderall actually show their performance is not better than those students who do not.  

"In reality, a lot of times students who are taking [Adderall] are using other drugs and also may not have the best study habits," she said. "They are sort of using it to play catch up and it doesn't actually work very well."

Although using non-prescribed Adderall is dangerous for students with heart conditions, Laitman said the real concern focuses on the improper use of the ADD medication by students.

"The real danger with using Adderall is when you mix it with other drugs like alcohol," she said. "That's when you increase the level of negative side effects so that's when it gets quite dangerous."

School of Environmental and Biological Sciences sophomore Greg Nowicki said he never used Adderall, but many of his friends do.

"I do hear about people using it, I know people who use it, and I know people who think that it is a miracle drug," he said. "They [use it to] get all their work done. I have no problem getting it done and I don't have a use for it."

Nowicki said although he hears about many students using the medication, he is not sure if it is necessarily a problem at the University.

"I know people use it when they have ADD symptoms, but some kids actually use it to their advantage when they don't have [ADD]," he said. "The kids who do have it sometimes sell off their extras to people that don't have it. Well, that could be a problem."