6533b853fe1ef96bd12ac262

RESEARCH PRODUCT

What users think about the differences between caffeine and illicit/prescription stimulants for cognitive enhancement

subject

description

Pharmacological cognitive enhancement (CE) is a topic of increasing public awareness. In the scientific literature on student use of CE as a study aid for academic performance enhancement, there are high prevalence rates regarding the use of caffeinated substances (coffee, caffeinated drinks, caffeine tablets) but remarkably lower prevalence rates regarding the use of illicit/prescription stimulants such as amphetamines or methylphenidate. While the literature considers the reasons and mechanisms for these different prevalence rates from a theoretical standpoint, it lacks empirical data to account for healthy students who use both, caffeine and illicit/prescription stimulants, exclusively for the purpose of CE. Therefore, we extensively interviewed a sample of 18 healthy university students reporting non-medical use of caffeine as well as illicit/ prescription stimulants for the purpose of CE in a face-to-face setting about their opinions regarding differences in general and morally-relevant differences between caffeine and stimulant use for CE. 44% of all participants answered that there is a general difference between the use of caffeine and illicit/prescription stimulants for CE, 28% did not differentiate, 28% could not decide. Furthermore, 39% stated that there is a moral difference, 56% answered that there is no moral difference and one participant was not able to comment on moral aspects. Participants came to their judgements by applying three dimensions: medical, ethical and legal. Weighing the medical, ethical and legal aspects corresponded to the students’ individual preferences of substances used for CE. However, their views only partly depicted evidence-based medical aspects and the ethical issues involved. This result shows the need for well-directed and differentiated information to prevent the potentially harmful use of illicit or prescription stimulants for CE. Citation: Franke AG, Lieb K, Hildt E (2012) What Users Think about the Differences between Caffeine and Illicit/Prescription Stimulants for Cognitive Enhancement. PLoS ONE 7(6): e40047. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0040047 Editor: Michael Taffe, The Scripps Research Institute, United States of America Received February 28, 2012; Accepted May 31, 2012; Published June 29, 2012 Copyright: 2012 Franke et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Funding: This work was supported by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) (Project No. 01GP0807) which has supported the work until September 2011. The BMBF had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. * E-mail: afranke@uni-mainz.de . These authors contributed equally to this work.