Substance Use and Motivations Among Students

An in-house questionnaire was developed based on the Drug Use Questionnaire for Students [22 (link)] and Drug Use Questionnaire for High School Students [23 ]. Specifically, students indicated (yes/no) whether they have ever consumed the following substances in their lifetime, past twelve months, and the past month: Cannabis (in the UK, cannabis remains an illegal Class B substance); Cocaine; Amphetamines; Methamphetamines; Nootropics; Ketamine; Hallucinogens; MDMA; Nitrous Oxide; Sedative Hypnotics; Heroin; other Opioids. To understand the motivations behind illicit drug use, participants ranked the following reasons from 1 (most important reason) to 10 (least important reason): curiosity; pleasure; provided substance by a friend; peer pressure; low self-confidence; boredom/lack of amusement; using substances as a form of self-medication for physical or psychiatric difficulties; lack of knowledge concerning the risks of substance use; and the presence of addiction in the home. Responses to each substance were summated, yielding composite scores (between 0–10) for lifetime use, past twelve months, and the past month.