Adderall Survey

[Clarus]

How many of you have used or taken Adderall? I'm curious to what number of students in colleges have taken it for explicit reasons such as trying to stay up all night to pass an anatomy exam or taking it for actually medically directed reasons by a doctor. It seems like this problem has been around for a while but hasn't been significantly addressed on many college campuses and is a prevailing problem in medicine.

As a student and applicant, I think it's quite ironic to take a medication that one was not prescribed to help pass an exam or get the extra "edge." To me, it seems like these drugs are used to "cheat" the system and that is unethical to me. For many others, they do not believe taking a drug to help you stay focused is cheating at all since the drug does not directly increase you chances of succeeding on a test, but to them I say you are cheating since you did not give yourself the necessary tools to prepare yourself for an exam so you resort to "enhanced" means of pushing yourself to the limit.

Just like an athlete would be scrutinized for using steroids or drugs to enhance their performance on the playing field, such would be a student who took a medication, without proper validation or consultation by a health professional, to study for extremely lengthy hours or crunch on a midterm paper or write an exam.

Thoughts? (I understand that the poll is limiting, which I why this forum is open for discussion.)

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[TaroBubbleTea]

I think it's quite ironic to take a medication that one was not prescribed to help pass an exam or get the extra "edge."

I think you misunderstand the definition of ironic. It's exactly expected that people would use stimulants to gain academic advantages if given the opportunity, but I digress.

I don't know how pervasive this is at my med school, but I would be interested to hear about others' experiences.

 

[aalamruad]

You should make it possible to select multiple options on the survey. Gonna get pretty incomplete results if you leave it as is.

 

[WhittyPsyche]

I went to school in the midwest for one year in HS and it was pretty much universally abused there, not just selling for money but people would literally just offer it to me in class without solicitation for free. There were regular drug searches in locker rooms. This was a very upper middle class semi-private school. The most bizarre thing I've ever seen. I imagine students that were that dependent in high school stay dependent in college and likely beyond.

In contrast in HS and college on the east coast I haven't seen anything even remotely as rampant. Always wondered why the culture was so different.

 

[aldol16]

In some competitive high schools on the East Coast, abuse is definitely there but you may not hear about it. At top colleges and universities, again you don't really hear about it but I'm sure it's there. There definitely is an illicit drug scene though.

 

[Allergic to Toradol]

So what if you are prescribed the medication by a psychiatrist? Is it still "unethical"?

 

[chibaddie]

I don't know how pervasive this is at my med school, but I would be interested to hear about others' experiences.

It's actually really eye opening to know med students who do lines before exams, and then get hypercritical over patients for their recreational use of drugs while getting a SOAP.

Adderall is ubiquitous.

 

[aldol16]

So what if you are prescribed the medication by a psychiatrist? Is it still "unethical"?

Depends. Is one using it to gain an unfair advantage? If so, yes. I'm sure people can find unethical psychiatrist to prescribe them some or fake the symptoms so that they can get some through prescription. The idea of the medication is to help those with true disabilities function normally, not to help those normal function at a higher level. That's my idea of medication anyway.

 

[NotASerialKiller]

You could have just searched for one of the many many threads on SDN about adderall. I can speed up this discussion by raising the same points that are always raised:

1) Coffee is a stimulant, you got a problem with that too? Or only if you have more than 5 cups?
2) Adderall doesn't make you smarter, it makes you stay awake and not get bored, so it's not analogous to an athlete taking steroids at all
3) If you can't study without pumping amphetamines into your body you're going to be a trainwreck by the end (beginning?) of med school, so you don't have to be jealous of people who do that

 

[Espressso]

Students at my UG med school would pay up to 20-30$ for a single adderall pill. Kinda crazy in my opinion.

 

[efle]

If you can't study without pumping amphetamines into your body you're going to be a trainwreck by the end

You don't know anyone with ADD that made it through med school ???

To OP, you're much better off looking at published research on the subject. Iirc the numbers are something like 10% say they've used as study drug in the last year, up towards 30% say they ever tried it at least once as a study drug while in college.

 

[NotASerialKiller]

You don't know anyone with ADD that made it through med school ???

Ha okay I should have been more specific. I'm talking about what people like the OP usually picture, someone of below-average intelligence not normally capable of As taking fistfuls of pills to be able to memorize enough to ace tests. Maintaining THAT would destroy you. If someone is occasionally taking part of an adderall XR to study then it's barely different from studying on red bull which I've never heard anyone complain about.

edit: Also for the record I do know people with ADHD in my class who take their meds as prescribed and are doing just fine, in case anyone who has ADD/ADHD read that and got freaked out

 

[efle]

Ha okay I should have been more specific. I'm talking about what people like the OP usually picture, someone of below-average intelligence not normally capable of As taking fistfuls of pills to be able to memorize enough to ace tests. Maintaining THAT would destroy you. If someone is occasionally taking part of an adderall XR to study then it's barely different from studying on red bull which I've never heard anyone complain about.

Why don't the people with ADD just drink lots of coffee instead or have a red bull? Haven't ever tried study drugs myself but I have to imagine the parallels to a 20 oz coffee or a 5-hour energy that get thrown around are a bit of a straw man, the entire demand for study drugs comes from being so much more pronounced, reliable and long lasting an effect !

I'd also say the parallel to steroids in weightlifting might be more sound than it seems at first. Just a shot of steroids won't give you a bodybuilder physique. It just massively amplifies what you get out of X hours in the gym...much like adderall doesn't make you smart, just lets you get a lot more done in a 24 hour cram window.

(largely devils advocate here)

 

[Astra]

Why don't the people with ADD just drink lots of coffee instead or have a red bull?

Many have. Didn't help them much or they gained a tolerance

 

[Goro]

Does it actually improve test performance? Citations, anyone?

It's actually really eye opening to know med students who do lines before exams, and then get hypercritical over patients for their recreational use of drugs while getting a SOAP.

Adderall is ubiquitous.

 

[Astra]

Does it actually improve test performance?

From my anecdotal college experiences (n=~ 50), it does. People who didn't have ADD/ADHD told me using adderall made them more alert and focused. They were able to consume information at a faster pace than prior to taking adderall. But at the end of the day, their intelligence was still the same.

 

[NotASerialKiller]

Why don't the people with ADD just drink lots of coffee instead or have a red bull? Haven't ever tried study drugs myself but I have to imagine the parallels to a 20 oz coffee or a 5-hour energy that get thrown around are a bit of a straw man, the entire demand for study drugs comes from being so much more pronounced, reliable and long lasting an effect !

I'd also say the parallel to steroids in weightlifting might be more sound than it seems at first. Just a shot of steroids won't give you a bodybuilder physique. It just massively amplifies what you get out of X hours in the gym...much like adderall doesn't make you smart, just lets you get a lot more done in a 24 hour cram window.

(largely devils advocate here)

For the first part, amphetamines increase your focus, meaning you can really "lock in" on something, which is what I described as not getting bored. Caffeine doesn't do this, so if you have ADD can drink a lot of coffee you'll get the stimulant effect without the focus advantage. But if you don't have ADD then sure the increase in focus can help, but if you pound 2 red bulls and have a huge test the next day chances are a lack of focus is not going to be a big problem. So it has an advantage there, but the disadvantage is that the crash afterward is much worse. If you have multiple exams, then the highs and lows of always taking amphetamines to study are going to be really tough on you in every way, so it's not something that people should be envious of as some sort of magic A+ pill.

The reason why I don't think the steroid analogy fits is because steroids allow you to achieve new heights in whatever sport you play. You're guaranteed to be stronger and faster than you would be otherwise. If you're taking a pure memorization test then adderall can be benefitial, but within a set amount of time. If you study efficiently and get proper sleep, you'll do just as well as someone who waits until the last night and pops pills. On top of that, it does nothing to increase your comprehension. So if you're studying for physics, or even physiology and are trying to understand complex mechanisms, it can only hurt you. If you pump Usain Bolt full of steroids (he doesn't use right? RIGHT?) he will become faster, but if you take a good student and pump them full of amphetamines before every test they might do a bit better on anatomy and worse on calculus.

 

[aalamruad]

Does it actually improve test performance? Citations, anyone?

I've seen research showing that it doesn't improve test performance, and only helps with test preparation. Can't seem to find the articles at the moment though.

From my anecdotal college experiences (n=~ 50), it does. People who didn't have ADD/ADHD told me using adderall made them more alert and focused. They were able to consume information at a faster pace than prior to taking adderall. But at the end of the day, their intelligence was still the same.

Perhaps it's similar to caffeine in that sense. Caffeine seems to improve test performance, but when you look at the data more closely you notice that it only improves performance for those who regularly consume it, since its function during that time period is actually just to reverse the effects of minor caffeine withdrawal, artificially boosting performance above a baseline that has already been depressed.

There's also some speculation that adderall decreases creativity, so even if it improves alertness and focus, it could be really detrimental when used on tests that require creativity (e.g. novel o-chem synthesis problems).

 

[Astra]

I've seen research showing that it doesn't improve test performance, and only helps with test preparation. Can't seem to find the articles at the moment though.

Wouldn't improved test prep translate to better test performance?

There's also some speculation that adderall decreases creativity, so even if it improves alertness and focus, it could be really detrimental when used on tests that require creativity (e.g. novel o-chem synthesis problems).

I agree. Tons of my friends who used adderall had complaints after stopping it such as hairloss, weight loss, headaches etc. Who would've thought using a drug that's not meant for you would have negative consequences?

 

[ScottTenorman54]

I've kinda mulled over the idea of trying it, especially during stressful times in the school year etc. I always refrained because I knew I'd get insecure about whether I could accomplish everything I've done without that crutch. Not worth it, it just feels dirty. But I suppose someone could say that about my daily espressos as well.

 

[aalamruad]

Wouldn't improved test prep translate to better test performance?

Yeah for sure, but when we discuss test performance we're generally referring to adderall's effects on the actual process of test-taking, i.e. whether being on adderall during a test helps, hurts, or has no effect.

 

[Avicenna]

LMAO quit ya bullsh*t sdn. My entire premed class spends their life in the library 24/7 whacked out on addys or vyvanse cranking out some mad study sesh.

cant stand addy. vyvanse is my drug of choice but i have a hard time with the crash so normally i just try to study sustainably up to the test instead of cramming. things don't always work out as planned tho unfortunately so i do sometimes take it but rarely...no more than twice a month and most months i go without.

 

[Allergic to Toradol]

Depends. Is one using it to gain an unfair advantage? If so, yes. I'm sure people can find unethical psychiatrist to prescribe them some or fake the symptoms so that they can get some through prescription. The idea of the medication is to help those with true disabilities function normally, not to help those normal function at a higher level. That's my idea of medication anyway.

I agree with this opinion, I'm simply trying to play devil's advocate.

 

[Danny L]

I see it a ton with my friends in fraternities although they're not really pre med. They talk about it pretty openly. Doesn't matter where they're from, although I'm not sure what they did in HS. I'm also at a t20 and I saw adderall use is esp high in those schools because of how competitive everything is. Don't remember where I saw that though

For HS I went to a public school that was basically a private school in the midwest. I didn't see a ton of adderrall use so I'm not sure what trend that one dude above is talking about (although I didn't really pay attention to my friends' drug use so maybe there is something)

I've never really felt the need to take it because I do really well in my classes w/o struggling with no adderrall. I've heard some of the side effects can be pretty ****ed up so I'm not going to fix what isn't broken. That said if I knew I could get a definite advantage from adderrall and I actually needed help to do well, I'd totally do it. It's gamesmanship and I have no problem looking for a competitive edge if I can get one w/o blatantly breaking the rules.

As of right now I'd compare adderrall use to using pain killers before a game rather than steroids. It's not against the rules like steroids (or makes you better than you actually are) but it gives you an edge during the game because you're not held back by pain (or in the case of school, poor study skills).