The Majority Of People Are Fine With Brain Doping, As Long As You Don’t Call It That

From smart drugs to over-the-counter nootropics, popping pills to boost brain power has become a billion-dollar business . After all, in our increasingly distracted, aging, and sleep-deprived world, anything that promises better concentration, alertness, and memory is more than tempting – for some it might feel like a necessity. Combine that with the fact that we don’t have conclusive evidence that these drugs and supplements cause long-term side effects and it’s no surprise that cognitive enhancers (both pharmaceutical and supplements) are growing in popularity. Of course, these pills are not without drawbacks, some of them quite serious. First, there’s limited evidence that nootropic supplements or pharmaceuticals have any effect on the brains of healthy people. For example, studies have found that those without ADD/ADHD who use stimulants such as Adderall experience moderate effects at best and put themselves at risk for side effects such as addiction and dependence as well as cardiovascular issues. Nevertheless, the misuse of these drugs by those they may not truly help is growing. While there’s long been concern about prescribing stimulants to children as well as their abuse on college campuses, a new study from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine suggests that the use of various types of cognitive enhancers is an increasingly accepted practice in the American workplace. The Penn neuroscientists set out to gauge attitudes towards cognitive-enhancing pills and they approached the question in a unique way. Using 3,727 U.S. volunteers via Amazon’s Mechanical Turk platform, they studied how people responded to the use of enhancers after reading vignettes that framed the use of these drugs in various metaphorical styles and contexts. So, for example, they read about an employee using the drugs as “fuel” as opposed to an athlete or student using them as “steroids” or using them to […]

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