Investigating the factors affecting the reduction of rural youth tendency to drug use (Case Study: Ardabil County)

addiction is one of the biggest problems that threatens the life of rural youth. Therefore, investigating the factors affecting addiction is an important step in combating with this deadly phenomenon.

the aim of this paper is to investigating the factors affecting the reduction of rural youth tendency to drug use in the Ardabil County.

The research method is analytical -explanative survey type. It can be said that studied population in this study consists of all youth living in rural areas of Ardabil County in 2017 (N=496), among which 217 persons were selected as statistical sample using Cochran formula. Sample size was determined based on the Cochran’s formula and the required data were collected through questionnaires. Content validity of the questionnaire was confirmed by professors and experts and its reliability was determined based on Cronbach's alpha (0.75-0.89).Studied Areas: Ardabil is an ancient city in northwestern Iran, and the capital of Ardabil Province. As of the 2016 census, Ardabil's population was 529,374.

the findings of this research show that addiction is very common among rural youth and several factors is involved at the tendency of rural youth to drug use and the most important of them is the lack of meaning.

the findings of this research showed that most important factors reduction of rural youth tendency to drug use in studied region includes four components (empowerment and support actions, combating poverty and making healthy of phenomenal environment, reinforcement of family foundation and psychological capital and extension of mass activities and reinforcement of value and ethical foundations) that explained variance and the cumulative variance by the five factors 48.93.