Cannabis Use and Its Impact on Australian School Students

This report examines the impact of cannabis use on students, focusing on the Australian context. It begins by highlighting the prevalence of cannabis use among young people and the associated risks, referencing studies on the topic. The report then analyzes three research articles. The first article investigates the correlation between cannabis use and academic performance, finding that some students use it to enhance their studies. The second article explores factors that encourage students to use marijuana and its impact on their academic careers, revealing that frequent users often have lower GPAs and are more likely to drop out. The third paper assesses the link between adolescent cannabis use and mental health, finding that while there's no direct relationship to depression, there are links to anxiety. The report concludes by summarizing the key findings and emphasizing the need for further research on the topic and its implications for student well-being. The report underscores the need for awareness and intervention strategies regarding substance abuse among students, particularly in the context of academic institutions.

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Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Introduction:
Adolescence has been identified as the phase that is connected with a major transition
to adulthood. According to Clayton et al. (2013) this phase is often associated with a wide
range of activities and development of a fervour to experiment with new things and in the
pursuit of doing so individuals invariably engage themselves in substance/drug abuse. It is
obvious that at this stage, individuals resort to the feeling of momentary euphoria and
overlook the critical consideration of the advantages or disadvantages associated with the
consumption of the alcohol or drug. It should be noted here that several scientific studies
have researched on the effect of substance/ drug abuse on the young generation and
accordingly studied its effect (Bachman et al., 2013); (Piontek et al., 2013).
In this regard it should be critically mentioned that this paper intends to investigate
and analyse the impact of Cannabis on the students of the present young generation. Further,
it should be noted that consumption of Cannabis has been associated with a number of
adverse effects in the students of younger generation (Mason, Zaharkis & Benotsch, 2014).
As mentioned by Chadwick et al. (2013), Cannabis is extremely popular among young
students who associate it with special names such as weed, reefer, grass or pot. It should
further be noted here that the use of marijuana is illegal in Australia and the nation has strict
measures to penalise any individual found practicing cannabis use. According to the
statistical data furnished by the Australian National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre it has
been suggested that more than 35.4 percent of the Australians aged 14 years and above
engage themselves in Cannabis use (Hall, 2015).
A number of factors have been associated with the initial introduction of Cannabis to
individuals. A few of the identified characteristics involve, exposure to weed by friends and
peer and voluntary or involuntary exposure to weed by relatives and immediate family

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members (Gruber et al., 2014). According to a research study conducted by Hall et al. (2015),
it was revealed that out of 2123 students, almost 340 of the students had engaged themselves
in marijuana substance use once in their academic life. It should be noted here that the
participants of the survey comprised of students who belonged to 8th, 10th and 12th grade
(Hall, 2015). The findings of the survey response clearly indicated the popularity of cannabis
use among the school students of Australia (Hall, 2015). Despite Cannabis being identified as
a high-risk intoxicating drug it should be noted here that the positive response of the students
clearly indicated that it was immensely popular among its users. One surprising aspect of the
findings included a high number of school students who indulged in Cannabis use. This paper
intends to present a vivid discussion on the key findings and summarise the themes
highlighted by the three papers that have been chosen by me to study the impact of cannabis
use on the quality of life of the school students.
Research articles:
The aim of this study was to investigate and analyse the underlying reasons why
young teenagers resorted to cannabis use. To develop a clear understanding about the same
three articles were chosen that were thoroughly studied and reviewed. The search terms
included were Cannabis use, Marijuana, impact on students, mental health, physical
health and Australia. After conducting the successful review, the article findings were
summarized in detail to obtain a clear understanding of the effect of drug abuse on children.
The subsequent paragraphs would deal with the summarising and analysis of the findings as
understood from the studied papers.
The first paper that was reviewed evaluated the effectof Cannabis use on enhancing
academic performance in the Australian University Students. According to Mazanov et al.
(2013), the study typically revealed that Cannabis use among the Australian students is

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popular as it enhances the quality of academic performance. The study further highlighted
that students prefer to engage in Cannabis use as it helps them stay up late and study hard for
their exams (Mazanov et al., 2013). In addition to this, a number of studies also specifies that
Cannabis use helped in improving memory retention and ability to concentrate on a particular
subject for a longer period of time (Karlia et al., 2014); (Buckner, 2013). The researchers
considered a sample size of 1729 Australian students who belonged to four major Australian
Universities (Mazanov et al., 2013). Further, the researchers proceeded with conducting an
online survey where the students were asked about their history of using caffeine,
prescription stimulants, illicit drugs and relaxants to enhance their study performance. The
results indicated that the use of Cannabis and other illicit drugs for enhancing academic
performance was much higher than the US students or the German students.
From the findings it can be clearly inferred that students resort to Cannabis use for
improving their ability to concentrate and improve their performance output in term of
academic excellence. On critically evaluating the study it can be said that the sample size
considered by the researchers was strong and that the results obtained could be generalized on
the basis of the strong sampling. Also, the qualitative study design involving the direct
responses of the students to evaluate the reason why Cannabis use was popular among the
students can also be considered a justified one. However, on analysing the findings of the
research study, it can be said that there is a need to develop a policy that advocates the
feasibility of Cannabis use by university students to enhance their academic performance.
The second research study that was selected dealt with the evaluation of the factor that
encouraged students to resort to the use of Marijuana. The authors of the research study
Suerken et al. (2016) conducted a research on the students perception and belief towards
Cannabis use. The research involved students from 11 colleges across the elite colleges of
North Carolina and Virginia (Suerken et al., 2016). The researchers proceeded with

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conducting a survey at 6 time points and accordingly obtained five cannabis trajectory
groups. The findings clearly revealed that the frequent users of Cannabis were either the
students whose graduation was delayed or students who dropped out. Further, the findings
also revealed that the marijuana user groups reported lower GPAs on an average in
comparison to the non-users. The sample size considered for the research study included,
3146 students across 11 colleges and the study was evaluated across six time points spanning
over the entire career (Suerken et al., 2016).
It should be noted here that group based trajectory models were utilized in order to
study the longitudinal marijuana use trends among the students of the college. In order to
analyse the findings of the research, the trajectory groups and the successive academic
outcomes were studied using the random-effects linear and logistic regressions. The
researchers identified five marijuana trajectory groups which included, 69.0% as non-users,
16.6% as infrequent or occasional users, 4.7% as decreasing users, 5.8% as increasing users
and 3.9% as frequent users (Suerken et al., 2016). It was also found that the marijuana users
revealed lower academic performance and poor GPAs. As mentioned by Choo et al. (2014), it
can be inferred that the decreasing users and the frequent users invariably dropped out of
college or delayed their graduation. On critically analysing the paper, it can be said that paper
considered a strong sample size that included 3146 participants across 11 colleges. Also, it
should be acknowledged here that there has been studies that investigated the poor impact of
marijuana on the academic performance of the students but this study focused on studying the
changes across different periods of time throughout the entire career. The cohort study design
was also feasible with the considered sample size and based on the strong sample size the
findings could easily be validated and generalized.
The regular use of Cannabis has been linked to poor mental health (Lev-Ran et al.,
2014). In alignment with this context, the third research paper focused on the relationship

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between adolescent Cannabis use and the associated impact on the mental health of the
budding teenagers. The study design adopted by the authors for this study was a prospective
cohort study that included the young Australian population. The research study was
conducted in Victoria, Australia and included a population cohort of 1943 secondary school
students (Degenhardt et al., 2013). The inclusion criteria included the age of the participants
to be from the middle teen age to the late 20s. The research study was based upon the nine-
wave study design. Six waves data collected was done on the basis of the adolescent stage
that comprised of the mean age between 14.9 years up to 17.4 years (Degenhardt et al.,
2013). Also three waves of data collection considered the phase of young adulthood that
comprised of the mean age 20.7 years, 24.1 years and 29.1 years (Degenhardt et al., 2013).
The researchers evaluated the psychological morbidity across the adolescent stage
with the help of the revised clinical interview schedule and the composite international
diagnostic interview at the age of 29 years. The frequency of Cannabis use was evaluated in
the past 6 months at the adolescent phase. On the other hand, the frequency of cannabis use
was also evaluated in the last year and DSM-IV Cannabis dependence was also evaluated at
29 years (Degenhardt et al., 2013). Further cross sectional and prospective outcome of
cannabis use was estimated as the odd ratio and multivariate logistic regression model was
used in order to predict the prevalence of major depressive disorder and anxiety at the age of
29 years (Degenhardt et al., 2013). The findings interestingly revealed that there was
absolutely no relation of Cannabis use at the adolescent phase and the prevalence of
depressive symptoms at the age of 29 years.
However, every day Cannabis use was associated with the prevalence of anxiety at the
age of 29 years. It can hence be stated that the paper clearly focused on the vital aspect that
regular cannabis use in adolescent stage was not linked to the appearance of depressive
disorder in adulthood however it was found to be linked with symptoms of anxiety. It can

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also be said that regular cannabis use among the adolescents exposes them to high risks
associated with disturbed mental health (Volkow et al., 2014); (Volkow et al., 2016).
Therefore to summarize the findings of the research articles evaluated it can be said
that 2 out of the three papers focused on the investigation of the students inclination towards
Marijuana. The papers focused on the sample size that comprised of College and University
students of North Carolina, Virginia and Australia. The findings clearly revealed that students
associated Cannabis use with better academic performance and improvement in terms of
concentration and memory retention power. On the other hand the third research paper
focused on the identification and the evaluation of an existing relationship between persistent
Cannabis use in adolescent and the onset of mental health disorder at the youth stage of life.
The findings revealed that although there was no direct relationship between regular
Cannabis use at adolescence and the prevalence of depression at the end of 29 years of age,
there were episodes of anxiety disorders. The study was conducted in an in-depth manner that
traversed across two integral phases of life that are dominated by Cannabis use and presented
an overview about the negative implication on the mental health of the young individuals.
Conclusion:
Hence, to conclude it can be said that substance abuse such as alcohol or drug abuse is
most common among the young individuals who belong to the category of academic learners.
It should be critically noted in this context that the identified reasons for the same widely
include, escape from reality, momentary euphoria, will to improve performance and
willingness to try out something new. In this regard it should be mentioned that in most of the
cases the students were completely aware of the negative implication of the drug but still
engaged themselves in its use. However, there also have been several cases when the young
teenagers have been impulsive or engaged in Cannabis use being unaware of the negative

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implication on physical and mental health. The large number of participants of the research
papers evaluated clearly indicates that a major proportion of the student population had at
least indulged in Cannabis use at one point in their academic life. The overwhelming
percentage of student dropouts and degradation in the quality of physical as well as mental
health on account of Cannabis use invites attention to frame stringent health policies to create
awareness among the young generation.

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