'High' Achievers? Cannabis Access and Academic Performance

Olivier Marie and Ulf Zölitz

No 8900, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: This paper investigates how legal cannabis access affects student performance. Identification comes from an exceptional policy introduced in the city of Maastricht which discriminated legal access based on individuals' nationality. We apply a difference-in-difference approach using administrative panel data on over 54,000 course grades of local students enrolled at Maastricht University before and during the partial cannabis prohibition. We find that the academic performance of students who are no longer legally permitted to buy cannabis increases substantially. Grade improvements are driven by younger students, and the effects are stronger for women and low performers. In line with how THC consumption affects cognitive functioning, we find that performance gains are larger for courses that require more numerical/mathematical skills. We investigate the underlying channels using students' course evaluations and present suggestive evidence that performance gains are driven by improved understanding of material rather than changes in students' study effort.

Keywords: legalization; student performance; marijuana (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I18 I20 K42 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 43 pages
Date: 2015-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu and nep-law
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Published - published in: Review of Economic Studies, 2017, 84 (3), 1210 - 1237

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https://docs.iza.org/dp8900.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: “High” Achievers? Cannabis Access and Academic Performance (2017)
Working Paper: ‘High’ Achievers? Cannabis Access and Academic Performance (2016)
Working Paper: 'High' Achievers? Cannabis Access and Academic Performance (2015)
Working Paper: 'High' Achievers? Cannabis Access and Academic Performance (2015)
Working Paper: 'High' achievers? Cannabis access and academic performance (2015)
Working Paper: ‘High’ achievers? Cannabis access and academic performance (2015)
Working Paper: 'High' achievers? Cannabis access and academic performance (2015)
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