Abstract

Objective: The current study aimed to determine drug abuse awareness and perception among youths.
Methods: A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted adopting multi-cluster randomized sampling. A standardized self-administered online questionnaire starting with formal consent was used. The answers were collected, scored, and analyzed.
Results: Age and gender were represented nearly equally in the 663 response samples, with a dominance of Saudis and university students. A total awareness level of 67.72% was elaborated, with the highest percentage for the social impacts (86.43%). Bad friends were assigned as the most well-known risk factor by consensus (96.2%). In addition, poor concentration was ranked the first psychological problem (79.6%), and crime was the most common social complication (90.20%). Of the preventive measures, religious commitment got the highest level of awareness (87.6%). About 76% of participants declared the high susceptibility of males to addiction. Amphetamines recorded the highest degree of perception (61.1%) and then Cannabis (57.5%). In addition, the Ministry of Health was assigned as the responsible sector for counteracting illicit drug use (86.7%). Social media was selected by 73% as the main source of information.
Conclusion: Adolescents had a good awareness level, except for the risk factors and physical complications. The negative relationship between awareness, age, and educational level was clear. Adolescents’ perception of the responsible sectors was limited.

Key words: Addiction, orientation campaigns, youth, illicit drugs, Saudi Arabia