Illicit drug use and educational attainment

Abstract

This paper uses data from the National Education Longitudinal Study to estimate the association between illicit drug use during high school and the number of years of schooling completed. The analysis accounts for the possibility that drug use is endogenous using two methods: (1) by controlling for individual-level characteristics measured before high school entrance; and (2) by using an instrumental variables method, with state drug policies and 8th grade school characteristics as identifying variables. Findings suggest that marijuana and cocaine use in both 10th and 12th grade are associated with reductions in the number of years of schooling completed. (Johnston et al. 2002). The recent increase in illicit drug use among youth has led to concern about both the short-term and the long-term consequences of this risky behavior (ONDCP 2003). PinkaPart of the concern about adolescent substance use stems from the idea that drug use interferes with the rapid accumulation of social, emotional and academic skills that normally takes place during adolescence. Drug use has the potential to detract from motivation, cognition, and memory as well as the potential to exacerbate existing mental disorders, all of which can affect academic performance (Hawkins et al. 1992, Brook et al. 1999. It is widely believed that drug use leads to academic failure, and, at first glance, the empirical evidence supports this viewpoint. Adolescent marijuana users, for example, are about twice as likely as non-users to drop out of high school, perform worse than non-users on some standardized achievement tests, and are much more likely than non-users to report poor academic performance. (Brook et al. 1999;Bray et al. 2000; Yamada et al. 1998, Diego et al. 2003, Pacula et al. 2003a.The relationship between substance use and academic outcomes, however, clearly has the potential to be bidirectional. While substance use during adolescence is associated with later academic problems, early school failure and low attachment to school have been identified as 3 leading risk factors for substance use, as well as good predictors of low educational attainment in the future, independent of drug use (Hawkins et al. 1992, Jessor & Jessor 1978. Substance use appears to be both a cause and a result of academic problems, and disentangling these pathways is an empirical challenge.The This study is the first to estimate using national data the effect of illicit drug use on educational attainment, while directly addressing the possibility that drug use is endogenous.The findings suggest that past month marijuana use in 10 th or 12 th grade is associated with a reduction in educational attainment at age 26 of about 0.2 to 0.3 years, while lifetime cocaine use by 10 or 12 th grade is associated with a reduction in attainment of about 0.2 to 0.4 years.However, there is evidence of some selection into drug use along observed variables, which may imply selection into drug use along unobserved factors that also affect educational attainment. 4The IV results, w...

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Predicting Young Adult Degree Attainment by Late Adolescent Marijuana Use

“…Early onset during middle and high school are associated with lower school commitment, grades, and high school graduation [6, 9, 10, 12, 15]. Recent longitudinal studies also show persistent predictive power of adolescent marijuana use on enrollment in and completion of post-secondary education [9, 12, 16]. …”

“…The national US Monitoring the Future study over-samples drug users for longitudinal follow-up, providing increased power to distinguish non-users from infrequent and frequent marijuana users. Finally, the majority of research has focused on early onset or use of marijuana during secondary school [16, 17]. However, the normative lifetime peak of marijuana use occurs later [18, 19].…”

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