Neuroenhancing Drugs Analysis

Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, industrialized nations have seen the medicalization of a plethora of diseases including the ongoing trend of acknowledging addiction as a ‘brain disease.’ The claimsmaking made primarily by Nora Volkow in the documentary Addiction encompasses the constructionist ideologies of socially constructing a problem, or in the case of deviant drinking and drug use, a disease. The functionality of medicalization in America is seen with many different conditions and diseases. For example, the recent spike in the prescription of medications for ADD and ADHD is a prime model for how a deviant set of traits can be spun into a more socially acceptable and treatable “disease.” Whether or not drug and alcohol addiction

In the speech,”Everything you know about addiction is wrong,” spoken by Johann Hari, attempts to inform the audience about how society takes drug addiction the wrong way and is completely normal for a human to use drugs as a last resort in life. The presentation starts off when he explains to the audience the many different drug addicts he has met in his life a few years ago while traveling a long 30,000 mile journey. He then goes onto stating from his research that everything humanity has been taught about drugs is completely backwards. A experiment was done in the 50’s to show the relationship between drugs and social life. The reason people start drugs is not because they want to, but it is caused by not being able to bear a present in your life. Moreover, there is cruel punishments of drug abuse in America and how Portugal has tried to change it in their country. Luckily people can get over any kind of addiction when they have a friend or blood relative that they can call on if they have a crisis. Finally, people should be more supportive and open in their heart when it comes to others that have a addiction. The author uses logos and pathos to emotionally connect and comfort the people that have thought about drugs in their life and people that dislike drugs and addicts, but using ethos he tries to make a change in the natural drug habitat.

In her article, Brain Gain: The Underground World of “Neuroenhancing” Drugs, Margaret Talbot discuss’ the use of different drugs like Adderall, to boost their productivity. She’s writing to people from college up to people who have 9 to 5 office jobs. She uses her essay to not be on one side or the other, but to analyze both points of view. She never puts in, or implies, that she has had a personal experience, and her background doesn’t give her much credibility to speak on the matter to people who already have an opinion on it themselves. Talbot uses anecdotes to…and she uses statistics. But her thesis strays away from what she was indicating about the drugs.

She begins by focusing on the idea that using neuroenhancers is similar to antidepressants. While interviewing Seltzer he brings to her attention that “using neuroenhancers is like customizing yourself-customizing your brain. For some people, he went on, it was important to enhance their mood, so they took antidepressants, but for people like him it was more important to increase mental horsepower” (para. 15). Comparisons such as these smoothly lead Talbot into another important comparison-that in the 15 to 1600’s writers would use tobacco or saffron for neuroenhancing. In the 1800’s they talked about using copious amounts of coffee to stay awake and produce writings. Students today “are just the latest members of a seasoned cohort, even if they have more complex pharmaceuticals at their disposal” (para. 16). This is followed by her comparison of neuroenhancing to body enhancing with plastic surgery. Everyone who participates in body enhancing through plastic surgery knows the risks and complications that may come with it but choose to partake. Neuroenhancing is no different, with all the risks of using stimulants like Adderall and Ritalin spelled out it is the user’s choice to take part. By making all these comparisons it may make the reader believe that it is potential that neuroenhancing drugs may not be all the different then some of the other legal substances we use.

Adderall is a familiar name that has been around for years. It is typically used for medical purposes for people with disorders such as ADHD and narcolepsy. It is a necessary drug for those who need it. However, in the last decade, it has become more than just a drug to calm those who are hyper or keep someone with a sleeping disorder up. It is being used by college students to keep them awake whether it is in class, for a test, to study late at night, and regular citizens in the country are abusing it. College students and citizens are abusing the drug and it has major affect with it, especially if they were not prescribed it. However, knowing where Adderall originated from, what it is intended for, and the side effects of the drug must

Out of the drugs that are popular in Toledo, heroine and cocaine are two of the most popular to be abused. Although there are many illegal drugs that are popular, one drug popular among many college campuses for abuse is Adderall and although it is prescribed for legal use many abuse it illegally. Because of the popularity among college kids across the nation, I have decided to do research for my third drug report on the effects of Adderall, specifically when abused and not when prescribed. During my research I will look into the physiological impacts of the drug, the psychological impacts of the drug, the possible social impacts of the drug, how many people use the substance, how many people die from this substance, how the drug impacts a

Our American culture sets a big emphasis on education, high GPAs, and outstanding business performance in the professional environment. In order to excel, there is so much pressure and expectation that college students today are more vulnerable to experiment and get hooked on smart drugs like Adderall, Ritalin, and Modafilin. College students are not taking these drugs to get high but to increase their concentration, energy, and time for studying.

In a recent New York Times article, Workers Seeking Productivity in a Pill are Abusing A.D.H.D Drugs, Alan Schwartz addressed the issues of this phenomenon carrying over to the workplace, as college graduates continue this trend. Living in a country that is driven by competition and gaining advantages, workers are feeling the burden, but could this reoccurrence result in addiction and an overall result in a negative cause for society? Using John Stuart Mill’s, On Liberty, and Karl Marx, Selected Writings, I will use their theories, combined with my own analysis, to identify when these prescription pills should be considered a troubling trend, and when they should

The season is finally here, many college students are making their way into the library and cramming information left and right for finals in hopes of not failing. With scholarly grades, comes hours of study sessions and hard work which results in an tremendous amount of stress put on an individual. As a result, many students resort to a different route and illegally acquire cognitive enhancements drugs in hopes of balancing their education and personal life. My first experience with these “Smart Drugs” was during finals week in my senior year of highschool, I was given several adderall pills from a close scholar friend and he briefly explained how these pills would aid me greatly during this stressful time. The first pill I took, I felt a great euphoric feeling within minutes and I knew this wouldn’t be the last time I would take this. Education in today’s society can be perceived as a competition between students as employers are searching to recruit the top students out of college. Therefore, students will do anything at any cause to be categorized as the top of their class. With all this in mind, it becomes apparent that college students find the need to use cognitive enhancing drugs to gain an edge among their education due to the superior benefits gained through the use of it.

Contexts 10, the prescription of a new generation, discusses the increasing prevalence of psychostimulants, through the use of prescriptions and illegal methods. In the eight years between 1990 and 1998 the number of prescriptions of Ritalin increased a five-fold (Hartmann and Uggen, 2012). In addition, the use of unprescribed Ritalin and other psychostimulants has also increased, as up to 25 percent of college students per campus have reported using non prescribed psychostimulants (Hartmann and Uggen, 2012). Since, doctors and other medical professions across the world haven’t been able to create a concrete diagnoses process, it would be easy to blame the high prevalence of psychostimulants on unreliable diagnoses.

Adderall like all other amphetamines has been said to cause nervousness, headaches, sleeplessness, allergic rashes, and loss of appetite. The drug Adderall is labeled as having “a high potential for abuse”. Another drug is also being studied that is said to improve short term memory with the downfall of making the user lose their long term memory. Due to the cognitive enhancements people are now able to focus and concentrate more on their tasks at hand. However, the down side of being able to focus more is the person loses their creativity. The stimulant alters the mind and keeps them so focused

In this article, the most used appeal in this would be logos. The main cause of this paper is to show the side effects of this drug which would be, “Acute psychoactive effects include changed in mood, anxiety, perception, thinking, memory, and attention” (Spaderna, Addy, D’Souza 525). In the abstract, they show what they are trying to prove to the audience of pharmacologist, doctors, and nurses. Afterwards, the

Advances in cognitive drugs are generating exciting medication for many neurological diseases, which also have usage for people who don’t medically need treatment. This medicine can help the body and brain function better by modulating the motor and cognitive structures (Chatterjee, 2004). With this improved development, yields multiple possibilities to a healthy, functioning person’s system. But despite this new advancement, it raises many ethical concerns.

Schwarz (2013), shares that Adderall, a prescription given to people with ADHD, is a stimulant that is widely used among college students to have an increased concentration and energy for multiple hours. Fee, who according to his parents, was had never showed any signs of ADHD as a child or anytime before his college years. Fee’s parents were surprised that his son was diagnosed with ADHD and given Adderall to help with ADHD effects. Fee was actually an intelligent college student who used his intellect to fake ADHD symptoms in order to be prescribed Adderall to improve his studies. Very quickly, Fee became addicted to the Adderall and found that it was almost effortless to continue to get prescription for the drug. According to Schwarz (2009), Fee was initially diagnosed with an ADHD without hyperactivity and was given medication (Vyvanese) to treat the disorder. Shortly after Fee was prescribed Adderall where his addiction was formed by the increasing dosage and failure of physicians detecting any type of addiction problem. While Fee’s parents tried to intervene to stop physicians from continuing to prescribe Adderall to their son, physicians were not helpful. One doctor even went ahead and gave Fee two future dated prescriptions without checking the online database that informs doctors of a patient’s one-year prescription history. Fee’s addiction to Adderall ultimately lead to him to his death. Fee hung himself in his closet and was found by his

In the article “Your brain on drugs is not a fried egg”, Author Dean Burnett a neuroscientist at Cardiff University, claims drugs do not fry your brain like modern pop culture thinks they do. Mr. Burnett published this article through the New York Times in 2016 addressing a public service announcement, aired in 1987, by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America. In the PSA, Drug-Free America compared a brain on drugs to an egg in a frying pan, this comparison bothered Mr. Burnett, causing him to write a persuasive article to inform the public of his viewpoint on narcotic effects to the brain. He believed that drugs varied in ways when effecting the brain, but relating them to an egg in a frying pan was utterly incomparable. He later explains that drugs do not fry your whole brain, but they induce activity where there is none. The author compares the brain on drugs to a “High-speed, power-generating; malware infecting, car” (Burnett). In the end Mr. Burnett completes the article stating drugs are very complex and very person by person.