Darcy Capistrano
Professor Miranda
English 3150
14 November 2018
Annotated Bibliography
Skalisky, Jordan, et al. “Motives for and Impairment Associated with Alcohol and Marijuana
Use Among College Students.” Addictive Behaviors, vol. 88, Jan. 2019, pp. 137–143.
In this study, 430 undergraduate students at a private university in Washington State were split into groups of alcohol users only and users of both alcohol and marijuana. The students were asked the frequency of use, the reasons of use, their impairment during and after their use. Coping is positively related to the frequency of alcohol use of both alcohol only users and dual users; however, social motives and conformity are prevalent in alcohol use and enhancement motives and pleasure are prevalent in marijuana use. The study was directly conducted within a college where marijuana is legal and the participants accessed the online survey through a QR code that was distributed during an undergraduate event, which both help reduce biases in the study. The source has cited research from other studies and it used appropriate measures and indexes for finding motives, frequency, and impairment, which makes this source reliable. “Coping motives for alcohol have been associated with long-term risk for increased alcohol use and alcohol-related impairment” (Blevins, Abrantes, and Stephens, 2016; Skalisky et al., 2019). This study was conducted to see the changes of motives across different substances in college students, which will help my argument in proving that substance abuse in students is prevalent for coping mechanisms of stresses in college. “Approximately 60% of college students report current alcohol use, and one in five report current marijuana use” (Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, 2015; Skalisky et al., 2019). Alcohol is an easy substance to be surveyed about because it is legal, but marijuana has just been legalized in some states and marijuana is a substance, that has been proven by this source, used for coping with academic stress.
DeSantis, Alan D., et al. “Illicit Use of Prescription ADHD Medications on a College Campus: A
Multimethodological Approach.” Journal of American College Health, vol. 57, no. 3, Nov. 2008, pp. 315–324.
1,811 undergraduate students from a public university participated in a study about their perceptions of using ADHD stimulants. 34% claimed that they illegally used these stimulants and most illegal users claimed that they used stimulants in periods of high academic stress. The surveys were anonymously taken across General Education courses, upper division courses, and campus clubs for a variety of ages and years of students. The survey directly asks the participants the reasons for use with the options of staying awake, better concentration, help in memorization, make studying more fun, for the high, to suppress appetite, ADHD medication, for fun, and other. This study is different from the other sources because adderall is a big example of substance abuse in college students that is, not only illegal, but used frequently because of the academic stress that students want to relieve; however, compared to the other sources, adderall is used for productivity and most of the students reported it to help get work done. The other substances are reported to impair students during and after the use. This study will help my argument because 175 people from the sample were interviewed and some of their words are included in the study. “‘Instead of just reading a little part, I can sit down and actually read you know, a lot of pages of a book. Like 50-60 pages of a book instead of reading 2 pages’” (DeSantis et al., 2008). This gives me actual evidence and experience to include in my paper.
Brown, Amy E. (2011). Occasional smoking in college: Who, what, when and why? Addictive
Behaviors., 36(12), 1199-1204.
Over one-third of young adults (ages 18-25) are current smokers, while 27% of college students are current smokers. 65% of college students are occasional smokers, but there are several reasons linked to their use. Smoking after drinking and smoking because of academic stress are the highest percentages among college students. Two schools with undergraduate programs participated in focus groups in a seven month period and surveys were anonymously taken at the end. As the focus groups got more comfortable with each other, their views and opinions were shared more, showing some dependence for stress relief and the idea that they do not want to quit because they are “not addicted”. The purpose of this study was to capture the factors of occasional smoking and conduct an open discussion about it amongst occasional smokers. “Participants broadened the definition of a smoker to include ‘social’, ‘stress’, and ‘occasional’ smokers at one end of a spectrum and ‘heavy’, ‘chain’, and ‘addicted’ smokers at the other” (Brown 2011). This source is useful because it specifies another substance abuse that college students tend to turn to during their years in college. Alcohol abuse is prominent in college students because of academic stress, but smoking is another substance that college students use for stress relief. “Many participants discussed specific extrinsic events or milestones that would motivate them to quit smoking: ‘Quitting is important to me when I graduate’” (Brown 2011). Including this study helps my paper give varieties of substance abuse in academic stress.
Pedersen, Daphne E. “Which Stressors Increase the Odds of College Binge Drinking?”
College Student Journal, vol. 51, no. 1, Spring 2017, pp. 129–141.
The three types of stressors studied in this article are academic, interpersonal, and development. The survey in this article does a good job dividing the academic stresses into academic concerns, unrealistic course expectations, concerns about grades; the interpersonal stressors into relationships, interpersonal conflicts, and conflicts in a living situation; and the development stresses into separating from family, balancing academic demands, and making decisions about the future This is useful because it specifies the stresses for students, making the results more narrow. It is different from all the other sources because it illustrates the use of the specific substance abuse in alcohol among students and their coping mechanisms for certain stresses. Undergraduates enrolled at the University of North Dakota were anonymously surveyed online asking the frequency of binge drinking, the most common subcategory of stressors in each type of stressor, and which stressor is associated with college binge drinking. “Although binge drinking is a phenomena associated with college life, it does not appear to be linked to the academic stressors considered here” (Pedersen 2017). The results showed that academic stress is the most prevalent stress in college, but it does not show the direct correlation to binge drinking. Bivariate analyses indicated that interpersonal stressors from relationships and conflict in a living situation were associated most with college binge drinking. “Highly motivated students may be less likely to binge drink because they believe that drinking may interfere with their studies” (Pedersen 2017). This contributes to my topic because those who are academically motivated would be more likely to answer the questionnaire since it was provided by professors, but most likely those who are unmotivated are not captured in this sample.
Ford, Jason A., and Pomykacz, Corey. “Non-Medical Use of Prescription Stimulants: A
Comparison of College Students and Their Same-Age Peers Who Do Not Attend College.” Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, vol. 48, no. 4, Sept. 2016, pp. 253–260.
The use of non-medical prescription stimulants (NMUPS) is higher among college students than those who do not attend college because of academic stress. College students who do not have ADHD take these non-prescribed stimulants to enhance their academic performance. 15,454 respondents of the ages 18-25 anonymously responded starting with if they took these stimulants during the past year, if they were prescribed, and their education status (part time, full time, not enrolled). “Respondents who were full-time college students had increased odds of NMUPS compared with respondents who were not enrolled in college” (Ford and Pomykacz 2016). Adderall is an NMUPS that has become common with college students for focus and productivity and this study demonstrates that heavy use is within full time students, that non-enrolled adults are unlikely to use these stimulants. In comparison to the other sources, this source generalizes the use of stimulants, connecting the negative affect of academic stress to substance abuse. “The report of a major depressive episode increased the odds of NMUPS. Finally, heavy drinking, marijuana use, other illicit drug use, and other non-medical drug use all increased the odds of NMUPS” (Ford and Pomykacz 2016). This helps my research in terms of proving that college students turn to substance abuse because of academic stress and college academic stress raises substance abuse.