Correlates of Substance Use among Students: A Meta-Synthesis of Empirical Evidence from 2016 to 2023

The present study aimed to discover and extract the correlates of substance use among students in experimental evidence from 2016 to 2023.

The current study was applied and qualitative, which was conducted using meta-synthesis method. The scope of this study was research articles between 2016 and 2023 for international research and 2016 to 2022 for Iranian research. By using a purposeful approach and until reaching saturation and using the integration approach and Sandelowski and Barroso's meta-synthesis method (2007), 156 articles were selected and after the evaluation criteria, 61 articles were finally selected. Qualitative data in the form of categories, concepts, and codes were analyzed and implemented and analyzed in Maxqda 18 software.

The results showed that psychological (cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and personality dimensions), family (communicative patterns, parental dimensions, family emotional atmosphere), academic (academic excitement, school dimensions, interpersonal relationships at school), social (community dimensions, interpersonal dimensions, socioeconomic status), and modulating (individual, family, social, and academic) correlates were related to students' substance use in empirical evidence. The value of Kappa index in this research was 0.89.

According to the extracted dimensions, it is necessary to design interventions, and plan and implement educational, therapeutic, and social policies in a systematic way to reduce substance use among students.