Monday, December 2, 2013

Why is there an increase in marijuana use amongst college athletes?


            Over the course of this class, we have had three different guest speakers and all of them mentioned that the use of marijuana is increasing amongst us. Our last speaker mentioned that there is an increase within the student athletes with marijuana use. I was curious to finding out why this trend increase was occurring. The NCAA performs random in-season drug test and about 23 percent of the athletes tested positive for using marijuana over the past year. Compared to the test from 2005 it has increased by 1.4 percent. A reason athletes are becoming more prone to using marijuana is because of the increase of marijuana use amongst all college students. A study followed 1200 freshmen over a 10-year period and found that marijuana use contributed to students skipping class and spending less time studying and affecting them in athletics as well. With the athletes peers using more and more marijuana they feel more pressure in “fitting in” with their peers and using drugs. There’s no scientific reason behind why marijuana is an increasing trend amongst athletes. It is more of a choice everyone gets to make.
Nick E W

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