After school, it is not uncommon to be passed by a high schooler driving erratically, blaring songs with lyrics like “I gotta stay high all the time,” or “smoke weed everyday.” Just as common is hearing about the wild antics of some lawless teenager from your next door neighbor.

Sometimes it seems that for as long as high school students have existed, they have been labeled as “hoodlums” or  “delinquents” who smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol, and experiment with marijuana.

But drug use, although still present at BUHS, might not be as widespread as adults expect.

Recently, a peer and I conducted a survey for our statistics class. Our survey involved the drug-use of students on campus, including the amount of coffee students drink per day, the number of cigarettes students smoked in the past six months, the number of times students consumed alcohol, and the number of times students consumed marijuana.

We questioned a sample of students from grades nine through twelve via an online survey. The survey was completely anonymous. In total, 71 students were questioned; 23 seniors, 35 juniors, ten sophomores, and only 2 freshmen. The survey does not give an accurate depiction of drug use among freshmen, but the numbers can provide an interesting look into the drug use of upperclassmen. An even number of males and females were also surveyed, revealing an interesting comparison between the drug habits of males and females.

Out of the students surveyed, most did not consume any drugs, including the 44 out of 71 students (or 62%) who did not drink any cups of coffee, which contain the drug caffeine. Students who did drink coffee typically drank one cup per day. Only one student consumed six cups a day, the largest amount of coffee reported in the survey.

Below is a table showing the average number of cups of coffee consumed by students per day.

We also questioned students about a more serious drug, tobacco. Out of tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana usage, we found that tobacco was the least popular among students.

Students’ tobacco use also revealed the beginning of an interesting trend that is also evident in the alcohol and marijuana use of students – while most students smoked no cigarettes in the past six months, and a few smoked one or two, the average drastically increased due to one student who smoked thirty cigarettes and another who smoked fifty in the past six months.

The large outliers of cigarettes smoked can be seen in the graph to the right.

A third drug we surveyed students about was alcohol. Out of the sample of 71 students, 37 students (or 52%), did not consume any alcohol. Out of those who did consume alcohol, four students consumed it once, seven consumed it twice, two consumed it three times, and very few students consumed alcohol more than ten times.

This table shows the number of times students consumed alcohol in the past six months, based on gender.

Although over half of the respondent students had not consumed any alcohol in the past six months, just like the tobacco trend mentioned above, the average was increased by eight students who consumed alcohol over ten times.

Out of all the drugs students were surveyed about, alcohol was by far the most popular. Even though the averages of marijuana consumption are much higher than the averages of alcohol consumption, alcohol still had more users (marijuana averages were increased by large outliers).

The last drug we questioned students about was marijuana.

Fifty one out of seventy one respondents (or 71%) answered that they had not consumed marijuana in the past six months. This makes marijuana the second least consumed drug amongst students surveyed, after tobacco.

Despite this, the average number of times students consumed marijuana is much higher than other drugs. This can be attributed to the few students who consumed marijuana over thirty five times in the last six months. It seems that the trend of a few students skewing the data through heavy drug use, as is seen in students’ alcohol and tobacco usage, can also be observed in their marijuana usage.

Another trend is also interesting. For each drug, boys had a higher average of consumption than females (the number of students who identified as a different gender were two few to accurately compare).

Unfortunately, I haven’t had time to interview drug users at the school to find out more about the information gathered through this survey. However, the data is still interesting, revealing previously hidden trends and showing the truth behind students’ drug use.