comparison of causes of drug abuse from the viewpoint of addicted patients and their families

background: given the high prevalence of addiction in iran and its social and health problems, addiction is considered as one of the few national health priority. this study compared the views of addicts and their families about the causes of drug abuse that referred to addiction centers in khorramabad, iran. methods: this cross-sectional study was conducted on addicts and their families who referred to the khoramabad government withdrawal centers in the age range of 15 to 65 years old. the survey tool was a questionnaire consisted of two parts: demographic characteristics and causes of drug abuse in five dimensions including individual, family, social, economic and psychological factors. collected data was analyzed with spss software version 16, using chi-square, mann-whitney and kruskal-wallis tests. findings: 48.3% of addicts and 63.3% of families said that low confidence has an important role in addiction. half of the subjects in both groups believed that successive failures in life and observational learning from addicted family members have a strong role in addiction. from the perspective of family members, the two factors of economic inequality, unemployment and lack of job opportunities, had significantly greater role in addiction in comparison with the addicts viewpoint. greater percentage of addicts believed that the role of insistence of friends and peers, relieving pain and physical illness, pleasure and positive attitude to drugs, were more important from other items and the differences of view between the two groups was statistically significant (p < 0.05). conclusion: to prevent and reduce the tendency toward addiction, major steps is essential in reducing anxiety and social concerns, increasing security and social welfare, culturing, especially in the areas of mental health and improving employment and the social economy.