Media Sosial sebagai Pendekatan Alternatif Pendidikan Pencegahan Dadah di Malaysia

Malaysia is a country rapidly developing in line with the development of world technology but is still plagued by drug abuse and drug addiction, especially among the youth. The results are very worrying and have a negative impact on users and threaten families, communities and the country and reflect the effectiveness of existing drug awareness, treatment and rehabilitation programs. Therefore, efforts to improve knowledge and information delivery on drug prevention education need to be reviewed and implemented holistically. This study examines the effectiveness of drug prevention media materials from the perspective of drug addicts and the National Anti-Drug Agency (AADK). The purposive sampling method is used to focus on a specific target audience to achieve the study's objectives. This research uses a mixed-method approach that combines quantitative and qualitative. All research data were obtained from 200 drug addict respondents from four Rehabilitation Centers surveyed through a questionnaire and 100 informants of AADK staff through a semi-structured questionnaire. The study's findings show that the effectiveness of publicity materials related to education (M=2.39, SD=.884) and drug prevention (M=2.26, SD=.674) in Malaysia is low. The study also shows that delivering drug prevention education messages through social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube is very important and effective. In the effort to provide preventive education messages, the production of short videos, compact messages, illustrations, and interesting music and graphics is seen to have a positive impact on the target group. Keywords: Social media, education and prevention, drugs, youth, Malaysia.