NCAA study of substance use and abuse habits of college student-athletes

Objective: To determine the substance-use patterns of National Collegiate A thletic Association (NCAA) student-athletes for alcohol, amphetamines, anab olic steroids, cocaine/crack, ephedrine, marijuana/hashish, psychedelicsiha llucinogens, and smokeless tobacco. Design: Self-reported, anonymous, retrospective survey. Participants: Male and female student-athletes from 30 sports competing at 991 NCAA Division I, II, and III institutions. Main Outcome Measures: Respondents were queried about their use of eight ca tegories of substances in the previous 12-month period. In addition, data w ere collected regarding substance use according to team, ethnicity, NCAA Di vision, reasons for use, and the sources for drugs. Results: The overall response rate was 64.3% with 637 of 991 schools report ing with usable data on 13,914 student-athletes. For the eight categories o f substance use, alcohol was the most widely used drug in the past year at 80.5%, followed by marijuana at 28.4%, and smokeless tobacco at 22.5%. Alth ough anabolic steroid use was reported at 1.1% overall, some sports demonst rated higher use, and 32.1% obtained their anabolic steroids from a physici an other than the institution's team physician. There were wide variations in the pattern of substance abuse according to sport. The results were also analyzed according to division, and it was found that the likelihood of al cohol, amphetamines, marijuana, and psychedelics use is highest in Division III. In addition, the probability of ephedrine use is highest in both Divi sion II and III, while Division Il had the highest likelihood of cocaine us e. Finally, the results were analyzed according to ethnicity and we found t hat the likelihood of use of smokeless tobacco, alcohol, ephedrine, ampheta mines, marijuana, and psychedelics is highest for Caucasian student-athlete s. Conclusion: The study demonstrates a wide variation of use across NCAA divi sions and sports, as well as among ethnic groups. The majority of student-a thletes engage in substance use, especially alcohol. According to the surve y, substance use is highest among Division III student-athletes and also am ong Caucasians. By examining reasons for use, the study will assist profess ionals in designing specific interventions for Various substances. This stu dy provides a methodology for surveying a large number of NCAA student-athl etes, which will be repeated every 4 years to identify trends in substance abuse.