Reliability and Consistency of Drug Reporting in Ethnographic Samples (From The Validity of Self-Reported Drug Use: Improving the Accuracy of Survey Estimates, P 81-107, 1997, Lana Harrison and Arthur Hughes, eds. - See NCJ 167339)

• NCJ Number: 167343
• Author(s): M Fendrich; M E Mackesy-Amiti; J S Wislar; P Goldstein
• Date Published: 1997
• Length: 27 pages
• Grant Number(s): R29DA07995
• Sponsoring Agency: National Institute on Drug Abuse
• Sale Source: National Institute on Drug Abuse; NCJRS Photocopy Services
• Publication Type: Issue Overview
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: DCC

Annotation

This article examines findings concerning the reliability of reporting on drug dealing and drug use, and discusses implications for ethnographic research on drug use.

Abstract

The article compares reports provided in retrospective life history interviews with reports gathered and summarized from eight prospective weekly interviews. The results were examined in the context of other recent work on the reliability of retrospective substance involvement reports. Most subjects reporting involvement in drug dealing during the weekly interviews also reported involvement in this behavior during the life history report. Subjects tended to deny current involvement in drug dealing during the life history reports, even though they reported involvement in the weekly interviews. Binary indicators derived from life history interviews about current drug use were consistent with reports provided prospectively. Subjects reported considerably higher use quantities and frequencies for substances in the life history reports than they did in the weekly interview reports. Tables, notes, references