Religiosidade e o uso de drogas ilícitas entre estudantes de uma universidade do centro-oeste brasileiro

Abstract

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the association between religiosity and the use of drugs (illegal drugs such as cannabis, cocaine, ecstasy, oxy and inhalants) in students from a university in the Brazilian Midwest. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study with a population of 2188 college students who answered a standardized and pre-tested self-administered questionnaire. All students of health courses regularly enrolled during the research period, of both sexes and aged 18 years or older, were included. The outcome was lifetime and past 30 days use of drugs. The exposure was religiosity assessed by the Duke Religiosity Index. Poisson regression with robust variance was used to estimate prevalence ratios and confidence intervals. Results: The prevalence of lifetime and past 30 days use of drugs was 39.5% (95%CI 37.4- 41.6%) and 16% (95% CI 14.5-17.6%), respectively. After controlling for demographic, socioeconomic, academic, and behavioral variables, individuals who never or rarely attended (organizational religiosity) or practiced (non-organizational religiosity) religious services or their religion had a 36% prevalence of lifetime use of these substances (95%CI 17-57%) and 25% (95%CI 10-42%) higher when compared to those who attended or practiced regularly, respectively. In addition, college students with low experience of religion in their lives (intrinsic religiosity) had a prevalence of lifetime use of drugs 79% (95%CI 50-212%) higher than those with high. Regarding recent use, undergraduate students with low organizational, non-organizational and intrinsic religiosity had a prevalence of past 30 days use of other drugs 59% (95%CI 18-214%), 33% (95%CI 5-68%) and 2.2 (95%CI 1.54-3,14) times higher than those with high religiosity, respectively. Conclusion: The results suggest that religiosity may play an important protective role in the experimentation and recent use of drugs among college students.