In undergrad at the University of Texas I heard of students doing something that I thought was unfair, scary, and illegal. I mean we each go to school, attend class and listen to boring lectures. Somehow we find ourselves prying our eyes away from Facebook to open that awfully heavy textbook that we spent $120.00 on never to have read it until now when we have test on chapters 1-10. We think to ourselves, how am I supposed to read though this 10 point font, all of these PowerPoints, and memorize the components of a cell body before the test!? For some students, it might be easier than what you think.
Doping is what I am talking about. Mental doping, as it is commonly referred to, is students using performance-enhancing drugs to get an advantage in concentrating better in preparation for classes and tests. One day I was at the fountain by the tower at the university talking to my friend about our psychology test. We were stressed out because we had over 100 slides to memorize as to the function of the brain and the frontal lobe this and cognitive that. She then said something to me that I never heard of before:
“Hey, do you ever take Adderall to study? I heard it helps you concentrate better.”
I was surprised and dumbfounded at the same time. “No I never heard of that, isn’t that for kids with ADHD,” I responded. It was after our first test in that class, I soon saw her popping pills while we would study. I of course was afraid to question it, not wanting to know. I heard other students would sell it to you on campus if you wanted it. After I graduated, I forgot about the idea until recently.
The American Bar Association recently published in its Student Lawyer Magazine, “Mental Doping-performance enhancing drugs in law school” (Fenton and Wunderlich, p. 16, Vol. 38 No. 5, January 2010). A déjà vu revisit to the subject brought back memories. I tore through the pages realizing that this drug phenomenon was not uncommon. Students are using these drugs to give themselves super memorizing abilities, super study skills, and super grades.
The most common drug abused, Adderall, is usually prescribed for Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder, and is also a very dangerous drug when abused. This drug has been linked to sudden death, psychosis, and suicide. However, it is so readily available because of the frequency it is being prescribed along with how easy it is to get tested for ADHD. The article looks in-depth at the effect on this mental doping in law school and whether or not it creates an unfair advantage and an ethical complex. Lawyers and law students have to follow the American Bar Association Rules of Professional Conduct, and according to the rules, a student who would one obtain Adderall illegally and two use it to create an unfair advantage to taking an exam or more importantly the BAR examination would violate the ethics code.
So what? How does this affect you? Think about it. You are in your twenties going to college and do not take any drugs and your classes is graded on a bell curve. Your classmate does take the drugs for an unfair advantage and is able to pull of that all nighter, get a better grade on the exam than you, and all of a sudden you get a C instead of a B because your classmate received the last cut off points for receiving a B. Take that to the next level. What if it is the MCAT or the LSAT and people are mentally doping? What if you are prevented from getting into medical school, business school, dental school, law school, or even just college because there are super brains out there out scoring and out performing the regular brains?
What’s the solution? So far, I cannot think of one that would not violate the right to privacy and would not create an undue burden for those who actually need the drugs to function. Should we have to be drug tested for an exam? What are your thoughts? What I do know is that I am not comfortable with people creating a drug induced advantage and performing better as an illusion. What I do know is that I studied the old fashion way, cracked opened that text book and ordered my Starbucks and started reading, “Chapter One, the beginning of the end.”
Yes, we have a disadvantage now.
We can do two things:
As you've said, we can break in their privacy, violate their rights and become enemies.
Or, we can fight them with studying smarter. Lets focus on learning to study, lets become a better student. Improve the way you study, improve the way you learn. Improve who you are, without using any drugs. Let us become better persons, in a good way.