Smart drugs impair the healthy

Smart drugs won’t make smart people smarter suggests new research from the University of Nottingham; instead it could impair their performance. A new study conducted by Dr Ahmed Dahir Mohamed focussed on Modafinil, a drug usually prescribed to narcoleptics but which is increasingly used by healthy individuals without wakefulness disorders. Figures estimate the so-called smart drug is taken by one in five students to boost their ability to study and improve exam success. The research, published in PLOS One, showed that the drug had negative effects in healthy people. “We looked at how the drug acted when you are required to respond accurately and in a timely manner,” said Mohamed. “Our findings were completely the opposite of the results we expected.” In a randomised double blind study, 32 participants were given a 200mg dose of the drug, while a further 32 received a placebo. They were then asked to complete the Hayling Sentence Completion Test – a neuropsychological test in which participants have to respond quickly and accurately. The drug slowed down reaction times, impaired participants’ ability to respond in a timely manner and failed to improve their performance of the task. However, both groups made a similar number of errors, suggesting the drug did not enhance the accuracy of the performance relative to the placebo. “It has been argued that Modafinil might improve your performance by delaying your ability to respond,” said Mohamed. “It has been suggested this ‘delay dependent improvement’ might improve cognitive performance by making people less impulsive. We found no evidence to support those claims. Our research showed that when a task required instant reactions the drug just increased reaction times with no improvement to cognitive performance.” This builds on previous work by Mohamed which showed the same drug impaired participants’ ability to respond in a creative way, particularly when asked to think outside the box. “Our study backs up previous research that suggests psychostimulants improve people at the lower end of the spectrum in cognition whereas they impair people who are at the optimum level of cognitive function - healthy people for example,” Mohamed said. “It looks like Modafinil is not helpful for healthy individuals and it might even impair their ability to respond and might stifle their lateral thinking, while people who have some sort of deficiency in creativity are helped by the drug.” Modafinil increases the latency of response in the Hayling Sentence Completion Test in Healthy Volunteers: A Randomised Controlled Trial The Effects of Modafinil on Convergent and Divergent Thinking of Creativity: A Randomised Controlled Trial