iarjimphIARJIMPHIARJIMPH2709-331Xhttps://doi.org/10.47310/iarjimph.2023.v04i01.015Addictions and Factors Facilitating the Menace: A Cross Sectional Study among Teenage BoysIntroduction: Rapid urbanisation, telecommunication, travel and migration bring both new possibilities and new risks to young people. These conditions may directly jeopardise the health of the individuals. Potentially harmful subjects – tobacco, alcohol and other drugs are now more readily available to adolescents and threaten their health in short and long term. This study looks to understand the distribution of addictions among the socioeconomically challenged Muslim population of Kalaburagi, Karnataka to understand the differences in the factors leading to increased use of prohibited/ harmful substances. Methodology: This cross-sectional study was carried out in the urban field practice area of Department of Community Medicine, KBNIMS, Kalaburagi, Karnataka. The study was carried out on health status of 260 Muslim adolescent boys who were selected by employing simple random sampling from the entire target population on the basis of the percentage of adolescents in the country i.e., 20.9%10. A pre designed, pre tested questionnaire was used to collect the information. The questionnaire consisted of queries regarding use of harmful and prohibited substances. Results: All the individuals from the Upper Class had one or the other Habit or Addiction (100%), followed by Upper Middle Class (57.14%), Lower Middle Class (41.93%) and Lower Class (40.0%). 35.29% of the Adolescents whose parents were Divorcees were addicted to substances that have ill effects on the Health Status. Unskilled Workers had the highest prevalence of Addictions (41.93%). 43.75% of the Adolescents who were pursuing their Graduation had Habits and Addictions followed by the Individuals in Pre University College (40.0%) and the ones who had quit during Primary Schooling (38.88%).