The Role of Positive Youth Development in Preventing Substance Abuse and Violence

Substance abuse has today become one of the major concerns of human societies. Substance abuse is one of the most important social harms that seriously threatens the society and in particular the younger generation. On the other hand, prevention of violence among adolescents is also one of the other priorities of public health. Considering substance abuse and violence as a health, medical and social problem, and that several factors affect it, it seems necessary to design an effective program to prevent substance abuse and its associated factors. Contrary to developmentall approaches in the past, the positive youth development approach considers the adolescence period as a period that can lead to desirable and normal outcomes and not just as a period to be managed and controlled. In developed societies, positive youth development interventions and programs are widely used to prevent substance abuse and violence. positive youth development interventions seek to reduce the amount of substance abuse and violence among adolescents through various ways such as identifying high-risk behaviors including substance abuse and violence and encouraging young people to avoid high-risk behaviors by replacing these harmful behaviors with positive activities and optimal adolescent health services. Therefore, it seems that programming in order to train the components of positive development and research on this issue can be an important and effective step in preventing violence and substance abuse.