Toward the Smarter Use of Smart Drugs

Abstract

The use of cognitive enhancement drugs (CEDs) among university students has raised widespread concerns about non-medical prescription drug use, safety, exam cheating, and study-related stress. While much of the empirical research to date has been conducted in the United States and Australia, this article examines perceptions and experiences of CED use among university students in the Netherlands and Lithuania. Our data come from two qualitative studies and one mixed-methods study and comprise 35 semi-structured interviews (20 in the Netherlands and 15 in Lithuania) and openended online survey responses from a convenience sample of 113 students in the Netherlands. Employing a crowded theory approach to interpret our qualitative data, we found most of our informants turned to CEDs to enhance their studying through better concentration and time management. Students used a broad range of pharmaceuticals (with and without a physician's prescription), recreational drugs, and nutritional supplements as cognitive enhancers, were generally well informed about the safety and efficacy of the substances they used, experienced both beneficial and adverse effects, and self-regulated their CED use to balance these effects, ensuring that their use remained moderate and thoughtful.

Powerful substances in tiny amounts

“…Microdoses most commonly served as mood and cognitive enhancers, allowing people to function at what they felt was a higher level than usual. There are clear parallels between psychedelic microdosing and the use of cognitive enhancement drugs among healthy individuals for performance improvements described by Corazza et al (2014) and Hupli et al (2016), as both forms of drug use can be motivated by a wish for enhanced performance in the workplace or in academic study.…”

“…The question of whether microdosing of psychedelic drugs should be characterised as "abuse", which was Corazza et al's (2014) label for piracetam use among healthy individuals, or as "functional drug use", which Hupli et al (2016) argued is the best way to understand the use of cognitive enhancement drugs, is not easily answered. Psychedelics are designated as drugs of abuse in most of the world, but there is a substantial research literature that indicates that their use may have therapeutic effect.…”

“…Normative characterisations of enhancement drug use varied substantially between these researchers. Whereas Corazza et al (2014) spoke of "abuse", Hupli et al (2016) found that enhancement drug use by healthy individuals could best be understood as "functional drug use". Coveney et al (2011) observed that the social acceptance of enhancement drugs rests in large part on the cultural authority of medical experts and may be subject to change.…”

Developing expertise, customising sleep, enhancing study practices: exploring the legitimisation of modafinil use within the accounts of UK undergraduate students

“…Hupli et al. (2016) have proposed that study drug use is not the reckless practice some critics condemn it as; similarly, the students we interviewed asserted that they would not consume drugs without what they considered adequate research. R9 (user) described this as follows:…”

“…(2010) found too that stimulants were leveraged to manage ‘periods of high academic stress’, for purposes of both reducing fatigue and enhancing cognition (see also Kolar, 2015). Qualitative and survey data obtained by Hupli, Didžiokaitė, and Ydema (2016) indicate similar patterns for university students in Lithuania and the Netherlands, and likewise Partridge, Bell, Lucke, and Hall (2013) for Australian students.…”