Study finds Marijuana use among college students at 35-year high

Marijuana use by college students hit a 35-year high, according to a study released last Tuesday. 

The annual Monitoring the Future panel study, a joint effort by researchers at the University’s Institute for Social Research, found that, in 2018, 43 percent of full-time college students said they used marijuana at least once in the previous year, while one in four said they had used it in the last 30 days. The national survey also showed that binge drinking and other types of illicit drug use had decreased among college students.

The study surveyed 1,400 adults age 19 to 22, including 900 who were full-time college students and approximately 500 non-college youth. Principal investigator John Schulenberg put it bluntly: He noted that prevalence levels for marijuana use have not been this high for three-and-a-half decades, when 45 percent of full-time college students in 1983 said they had used marijuana in the last 12 months. That same year, 26 percent said they had used marijuana at least once in the last 30 days.

Schulenberg also noted the dramatic increase in vaping nicotine and marijuana among college students, particularly among the percentage who said they had done so at least once in the previous year. [Read more at The Michigan Daily]