Skeptical Sisson Adderall's unfair advantage

Author: Douglas Sisson

Eager to deal with problems with a quick fix, Western society turns to prescription medications. Adderall, prescription amphetamine salts, is used by numerous students and adults to treat Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). For others, the medication serves as prescription speed to increase academic productivity by improving a patient's attention span and decreasing distractibility. Stimulants - like coffee in the mornings or a Red Bull to pull all-nighters - are a reality for college students. Yet students who consume Adderall have an unfair academic advantage over those of us relying on caffeine or organized study habits to complete required assignments.

Coffee, the stimulant of choice for students and faculty at the College, sets the bar of feasible academic productivity at a level that can be fairly accessed by the community at large. Red Bull, caffeine pills, soda beverages and Starbucks Double Shots - each sold at the College - additionally cater to the lucrative market of caffeine-induced study aides. Caffeine is effective in keeping a student awake, but Adderall is a prescription medication that not only decreases the need for sleep, it increases one's ability and drive to perform academically.

Increasing numbers of students are choosing prescription medications after discovering their fantastic ability to heighten reading rates, improve concentration and overall make studying more enjoyable. As a first-year student, it didn't take me long before I realized the advantages students prescribed to Adderall experienced. Soon thereafter, I met with various credible psychiatrists and after sharing with them my struggle to concentrate and read free of distraction - something I feel any human experiences - I became diagnosed with ADD and was prescribed Adderall.

It wasn't until this summer that my legitimately prescribed love affair with Adderall came to a much needed end. Yet, there's something to be said about learning to multi-task under the influence of medication and now having to do the same tasks with only the aid of coffee and organized study habits. Strictly from the perspective of academic productivity, the benefits of consuming Adderall greatly outweigh using only caffeinated beverages.

It's important I mention that Adderall is a valuable medication for students and possibly faculty with legitimate ADD. However, I'm skeptical of misusing medication to give certain individuals an unfair advantage over others.

Students crushing-up and snorting Adderall sounds like something Tony Montana or Al Pacino's character in "Scarface" might do on a weekend rather than the behavior of students attending an East Coast liberal arts college. However, Adderral's unique stimulant-based chemical makeup, when crushed to a powder, allows students fiending for a social life an accessible and affordable alternative to cocaine. This "work hard, play hard" social cycle is a slippery slope often unbeknownst to mental health professionals.

Medicinal unfair advantages exist in various facets of society, especially when pharmaceutical companies continue funding research and production of new drugs. For instance, a fine line exists between legitimate need and blatant abuse of prescription medication.

Today I am no longer under the influence of Adderall. My life no longer runs on fast-forward with the aid of prescription speed. I'm less able to multi-task in ways I've become accustomed to, my brain naturally wanders from time to time in class and the once-familiar decision to pull an all-nighter is a far greater feat to endure than in years past.

For me, the negative side effects of taking Adderall - irritability, loss of appetite, difficulty sleeping, paranoia - outweighed the advantages of increased academic productivity. Consistent with consumer-driven capitalism, pharmaceutical companies will gradually find ways to minimize adverse side effects in highly marketable drugs like Adderall. For now, however, the cost of maximizing academic productivity by consuming prescription medications comes with great risks to one's mental and physical health. Coming from someone who has felt the highs and lows that prescription medications can do to one's emotions, I'd never go back to the dark side brought on by pharmaceutical companies merely trying to make money with the elastic opportunity cost of my brain's organic functioning.

Douglas Sisson '07.5 is an International Studies/Latin America major from Oak Brook, Ill.