The relationship between marijuana initiation and dropping out of high school

Abstract

The prevalence of marijuana use among young people has risen rapidly in recent years, causing concern over the potential impact on academic performance of such use. While recent studies have examined the effect of alcohol use on educational attainment, they have largely ignored the potential negative effects of other substances, such as marijuana. This paper examines whether the relationship between the initiation of marijuana use and the decision to drop out of high school varies with the age of dropout or with multiple substance use. Data are from a longitudinal survey of 1392 adolescents aged 16-18 years. The results suggest that marijuana initiation is positively related to dropping out of high school. Although the magnitude and significance of this relationship varies with age of dropout and with other substances used, it is concluded that the effect of marijuana initiation on the probability of subsequent high school dropout is relatively stable, with marijuana users' odds of dropping out being about 2.3 times that of non-users. Implications of these conclusions are considered for both policy makers and researchers.

Early-onset cannabis use and cognitive deficits: what is the nature of the association?

“…Under this hypothesis, individuals who begin smoking cannabis at an early age, for whatever reason, are less motivated to pursue an education (which would be consistent with our observations in Table 1, as well as those of other investigators (Bray et al, 2000;Hammer and Vaglum, 1990;Lynskey and Hall, 2000)), and would thus remain particularly disadvantaged on tests requiring verbal abilities. This prediction is consistent with our observation that early-onset users were sharply distinguishable from controls primarily on tests requiring verbal abilities, including VIQ itself, memory of word lists on the BSRT, and semantic categories on the FAS test.…”

Adolescent cannabis and tobacco use and educational outcomes at age 16: birth cohort study

“…Other studies in general have not considered both cannabis and tobacco use by young people and subsequent educational outcomes in the same cohort; rather, they have reported the effects of cannabis use adjusted for tobacco use. A small number of previous studies have considered the effects of tobacco use on educational attainment, and have reported similar patterns of association to those that we observed 24, 25, 26, 27. The associations for cannabis were found to be non‐specific; due to tobacco use by age 15 showing very similar patterns of association with the same educational outcomes.…”

Cannabis use among middle and high school students in Ontario: a school-based cross-sectional study

“…Third, the study may actually underestimate the prevalence of cannabis use among adolescents, considering that those who have dropped out of school may have particularly high rates of frequent cannabis use. 33 Finally, although the class response rate was high (88%), the student participation rate was relatively low (59%) and may have negatively affected the external validity of the results. However, the data did not show evidence of appreciable nonresponse bias.…”