Raising Awareness About Prescription and Stimulant Abuse in College Students Through On-Campus Community Involvement Projects.

As prescription stimulants become more common on college campuses, concerns have been raised about the abuse of these drugs by college students. Estimates are that up to 20% of college students abuse prescription stimulants, most often by ingesting medications not prescribed to them. In an effort to raise awareness and disseminate information about the potential harmful effects of abusing prescription stimulants, students enrolled in a Health Psychology course participated in small-group community involvement projects. This paper describes the value of such projects, details the specific projects completed by the students, how the projects were graded and assessed, and discusses the usefulness of these and similar projects in neuroscience-related courses.