So-called cognitive enhancing drugs are relatively common in higher education, especially among students who are white, male, and attend highly selective institutions. Using qualitative data from a diverse sample of 32 students at an elite university, the present study aims to examine whether students perceive CED use to be advantageous, equitable, and fair. Participants were either medical or nonmedical users of CEDs—primarily ADHD stimulant medications such as Adderall. Data were first coded openly, then axially into themes, and finally arranged to (...) respond to research aims around social and ethical concerns. Ethical perceptions and behavioral justifications varied by participants’ personal use frequency, class standing, and perceived social norms surrounding CEDs. Among the salient themes to emerge was the belief that CED use is a lesser or more tenable form of cheating, that the vagueness and prevalence of ADHD justifies nonmedical use, and that above all, CEDs are advantageous. Some participants expressed concern about the advantageousness of CEDs when coupled with a perceived imbalance of their use among students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds, with one calling it “the white version of cheating.” Implications for cheating and drug use prevention are discussed, situating cognitive enhancement as an emerging ethical and social equity concern in higher education. (shrink)

Objectives To understand the ethical principles guiding college students’ abstention from pharmacological cognitive enhancement, and to determine the correlates associated with endorsing different principles. Design One-stage cluster sampling was used to implement a paper-based survey among undergraduate students attending one university in the U.S. Thematic analysis was used to explore the ethical principles guiding PCE abstention. Multivariate logistic regression analyses were used to examine sociodemographic correlates associated with endorsed ethical principles. Participants Of the 499 eligible students who completed the survey, (...) 259 students had a negative attitude towards PCE, did not engage in PCE, and provided reasons for abstention. Results The thematic analysis resulted in the identification of eight themes, with respondents often endorsing more than one theme per response. The three themes most endorsed were non-malfeasance, disapproval of drugs and dosage beneficence. The sociodemographic correlates associated with endorsing each theme varied across themes. Conclusions Students abstain from PCE for a multitude of reasons, many of which are guided by ethical principles. These findings may be incorporated into future prevention programming messages. (shrink)

Drugs used to provide improvement of cognitive functioning have been shown to be effective in healthy individuals. It is sometimes assumed that the use of these drugs constitutes cheating in an academic context. We examine whether this assumption is ethically sound. Beyond providing the most up-to-date discussion of modafinil use in an academic context, this contribution includes an overview of the safety of modafinil use in greater depth than previous studies addressing the issue of cheating. Secondly, we emphasize two crucial, (...) but hitherto nearly overlooked, nuances to the issues: the potential for modafinil to decrease inequality and disadvantage in academic settings, and the fact that how modafinil is used dramatically impacts its effects on health, coercion, fairness, authenticity and effort. Finally, we explicitly defend the position that there are no qualitatively morally relevant differences between modafinil use and other enhancement modalities; any such differences are in degree,... (shrink)

Researchers are increasingly applying neuroscience technologies that probe or manipulate the brain to improve educational outcomes. However, their use remains fraught with ethical controversies. Here, we investigate the acceptability of neuroscience applications to educational practice in two groups of young adults: those studying bioscience who will be driving future basic neuroscience research and technology transfer, and those studying education who will be choosing among neuroscience-derived applications for their students. Respondents rated the acceptability of six scenarios describing neuroscience applications to education (...) spanning multiple methodologies, from neuroimaging to neuroactive drugs to brain stimulation. They did so from two perspectives (student, teacher) and for three recipient populations (low-achieving, high-achieving students, students with learning disabilities). Overall, the biosciences students were more favorable to all neuroscience applications than the education students. Scenarios that measured brain activity (i.e., EEG or fMRI) to assess or predict intellectual abilities were deemed more acceptable than manipulations of mental activity by drug use or stimulation techniques, which may violate body integrity. Enhancement up to the norm for low-achieving students and especially students with learning disabilities was more favorably viewed than enhancement beyond the norm for high-achieving students. Finally, respondents rated neuroscientific applications to be less acceptable when adopting the perspective of a teacher than that of a student. Future studies should go beyond the acceptability ratings collected here to delineate the role that concepts of access, equity, authenticity, agency and personal choice play in guiding respondents’ reasoning. (shrink)