Newcastle students' opinions on smart drugs

‘Smart drugs’ are medications usually prescribed to patients suffering from ADHD or narcolepsy, in aid to improve cognitive functions such as concentration, reaction time, attention and focus. Besides the clinical purposes of these drugs, they’re also used by students during exam time as performance enhancers.

Early 2018 Netflix’s ‘Take Your Pills’ first became available worldwide. It is a documentary that showcases the detrimental effects and consequences of carelessly ‘popping’ study drugs (also known as smart drugs). As the film mainly focuses on the US experience with misuse of prescription drugs, it is easy to think it’s a problem only evident across the pond.

In 2017 The Guardian reported on a nation-wide call by Thomas Lancaster, an associate dean at Staffordshire University for UK universities to address the growing numbers of students using smart drugs during stressful and intense study periods i.e. exam time, even going so far as suggesting “think about drug testing to ensure the integrity of the examination process”.

A recent survey conducted by NUS and Release showed that 1 in 10 participants of the survey had taken a smart drug for the benefits of improving concentration and focus. 1 in 5 students that had taken any drugs before said they had also tried smart drugs. 6% admitted to using smart drugs at least once a month.

It’s clear both nation-wide and locally that the use of smart drugs is growing but it’s nowhere near the epidemic that it is in the USA. If there is anything we can learn from our across the pond neighbours, it’s that smart drug use has the potential and appeal to become a nation-wide solution for the increased pressure put on students to perform better.

When conducting our research on general Newcastle student population, we found that some students were unaware of smart drugs and other were only vaguely familiar. However, when this topic came up at the SSDP Society meeting that we attended, the society members in attendance were very much familiar with smart drugs, their use and knew of it being a common practice among students, especially those studying in fields such as medicine or engineering.