EFFECT OF DRUG ABUSE ON THE ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN EDO STATE

Abstract

The study determined the effect of drug abuse on the academic performance of undergraduate students in Edo state. Two research questions and two hypotheses were raised to guide the study. The study adopted descriptive survey research design. The population of the study was made of 9,805 final year undergraduate students from seven universities in Edo State. The simple random sampling technique was used to select 245 final year undergraduates students used for the study. The instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire on a four (4) point rating scale. The instrument was validated by two experts from Benson Idahosa University, Benin City. Spearman rank order was used to determine the reliability of the instrument which yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.86. Out of the 245 questionnaires administered to the undergraduate student respondents, 218 copies were retrieved and used for analysis. Mean and standard deviation were the descriptive statistical tools were used to analyze the two research questions while t-test was the inferential statistics used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. For the research questions, the decision was based on the criterion mean of 2.50. For the hypotheses, since the calculated value of t (t-cal) was less than the table value of t (t-crit), the null hypotheses were accepted. The findings of the study revealed that the causes of drug abuse among undergraduate students are psychological, social and biological; and these have effect on students’ academic performance. The study recommended among other things that Government should make drug education compulsory at all levels of the educational system as this will reduce the ignorance level of what essentially constitute drug abuse and the likely causes and effects of it among undergraduate students. Keywords: Drug, Drug Abuse, Academic Performance, Undergraduate Students.