Introduction
Cannabis is one of the most prevalent illicit drugs in the world, especially among young adults (Ammett, 2000; Vergas & Trujillo, 2012). In some European countries, about 27% of the population (aged between 15 and 64 years) have tried cannabis at some time in their lives (Degenhardt et al., 2008), with consumption of the substance being more extensive among men than women. However, this disparity between the sexes regarding the consumption of cannabis has been decreasing in the last few years (Degenhardt et al., 2008).
Illicit drug use, cannabis inclusive, continues to attract empirical attention among researchers worldwide because of the deleterious effects it portends for the users, the family and the society at large. Of speci?c interest and which is burdensome is the unprecedented recreational cannabis use among students. In Nigeria, cannabis is among the widely used illicit drugs at present. The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA: 2007) report showed an alarming 22% of the total Nigerian population using cannabis. Other studies spanning several decades indicated prevalence ranging from 0.4% 84% (Gureje et al., 2007) across different populations. Documented evidence in cross sectional studies among secondary school pupils, showed that cannabis abuse ranges from 9.4% to 26% (Eneh & Stanley, 2004). Among tertiary university students, current cannabis use ranged from 0.6% among medical students (Makanj uola et al., 2007) to 9% among other university non-medical students (Abikoye et al., 2014), while lifetime use ranged from 2.3% (Makanjuola etal., 2007) to 14.5% (Abikoye et al., 2014).
University students are more susceptible to drug abuse due to myriad factors ranging from academic stress, desire to remain awake at night; peer- group pressure; increasingly falling educational standard, drugs accessibility; violence and the dire need for risk sexual behaviors enhancement (Obot, Ibanga, Ojiji & Wai, 2001; Gureje & Olley, 1992). Other risk factors include social approval for drug consumption in people’s social environment such as family and peer group (Agrawal et al., 2006;
Ellickson et al., 2007; Guxens et al., 2007) and socio-demographic variables (Guxens, et al., 2007).