Student athletes' use of substance abuse is major issue in the world of sports. Does the old theory stating that student athletes tend to stay away from drugs and alcohol hold true today? From my personal experience as a former high school athlete, I doubt this is true. With the many records of student athletes being arrested for alcohol and drug abuse, substance abuse has truly become a problem. The studies available show the correlation of usage between student athletes and the general student population? Hopefully, this information would be helpful in setting up a drug prevention program at the high school and middle school level. If so, maybe society could improve its efforts at alleviating this problem.

Many of these problems underly in the attitudes of these athletes. Of the athletes who are considered at risk of using substance abuse, seventeen percent of the athletes felt that marijuana use was an acceptable way to deal with the pressures of athletics. Instead of abstaining from use due to health risks, many refrain from drug use simply due to the fear of getting caught. Peer pressure from teammates is also indicated as a major influence as to whether or not athletes use o

Results pertaining to the frequency of alcohol use and attitudes dealing with adolescent alcohol abuse show that male high school athletes both use and abuse alcohol more frequently than non-athletes do. In addition, male non-athletes tend to abstain from alcohol use more than athletes. However, they found no difference in the frequency of alcohol consumption between female athletes and non-athletes. There was also no difference in the frequency of alcohol and between male and female athletes, but three fourths of the male athletes reported being under the influence when consuming alcohol compared to half of the

The drug use of high school students participating in athletics have a different pattern of marijuana use compared to non-athletes. Male athletes are found most likely to use marijuana and to use it more than male non-athletes would. On the other hand, female athletes are found to use or try marijuana less often than their non-athletic counterparts. Females are more likely to wait until post-high school before trying it for their first time as opposed to female non-athletes.

Why are college athletes at risk for drug abuse and effective drug treatment programs? Many college athletes feel that the programs should at least try to improve the overall health of the student athlete along with the deterring drug use. In addition, the drug education programs such as DARE should include more than just giving information an

Some common words found in the essay are:
Overman Terry, Athletes Student, female athletes, substance abuse, college athletes, athletes non-athletes, school athletes, student athletes, frequency alcohol, alcohol users, athletes found, male female athletes, alcohol in-season off-season, difference frequency alcohol, student athletes student, consequences drug, school alcohol users,
Approximate Word count = 975
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)