Learning Objective #1: comprehend the drug addiction problems in university students in Brazil

Learning Objective #2: discuss a way to health promotion and drug addiction problems' prevention

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This study aimed to understand how the health-disease process happens among university students that live in the studentsx housing in the Butantã campus of University of São Paulo, Brazil, in relation to alcohol abuse and of other street drugs. It aimed also to identify the objective conditions of this process and to analyze the underlining manifestations of gender problems associated to it. The theoretical basis for this study was the Social Determination Theory of Health-Disease Process, as well as the analytical category of Gender: these allowed to a better comprehension of the quality of this process in each subject. Data were collected through interview with eight students living in the campus about their life'sx stories and their alcohol and other drug-use behaviors, before and after their moving to the campusx housing building, and topics on gender prejudice and differences in the use of drugs between men and women. Data were treated with the content analysis, according to the method proposed by Pierre Bordieu, which considers the reality expressed in the speeches of the living subjects. After data analysis, we concluded that the freedom environment of the studentsx housing in the campus, the depression, the unemployment and the characteristics of the campus environment are conditions that favor alcohol and drugs abuse among subjects that move to the campus already dependent on drugs. We concluded also that in the campus housing, the gender stereotypes, like the feminine inferiority, prejudices and blaming for the use of drugs are reproduced.