Case Study on Boston Fights Drugs

Boston Fights Drugs

1. I would have selected focus groups for my methodology if I had been conducting this research. Of the options, quantitative surveys, ono-on-one interviews, and qualitative surveys (focus groups), the focus groups seemed like the most effective option.  The quantitative surveys seemed like a good option at first but then I read that the response rate was only 5% to 20%.  Considering the cost of $10,000 by mail, or $15,000 by phone, this response rate did not seem high enough for the cost.  The focus groups seems like they would provide accurate information at a reasonable cost especially since these focus group participants would only need to be paid $15 versus the normal $25-$50.  I also liked that “the moderator only loosely guided the flow of discussion.”  I think that this will allow for the discussion to flow naturally and provide an accurate representation of the feelings about drugs and drug use and Boston.  I thought it was good that the discussion could be taped and interpreted by the researchers so that they could gain as much insight from the focus groups as possible, without having to rely solely on the notes of the moderator.  The biggest downside to focus groups would be the extra costs required if we decide we needed to hire professional psychologists to interpret the data, but despite this, focus groups seemed the be the most effective option.

1. The team’s model divided people into four groups.  These groups were nonusers, experimental users, regular users, and drug-dependent individuals.  Nonusers did not use drugs and have little exposure to drugs, as their awareness increases, nonusers have to decide whether or not to use drugs.  Experimental users are people who have had the opportunity to try drugs, are familiar with the names of drugs, their availability, and characteristics of different drugs, but although they have experimented with drugs, they do not actively seek them out or use them routinely. Regular users had a regular pattern of drug use and continuing abuse. They actively seek out and use drugs at predictable intervals.  Finally, drug-dependent individuals are a limited number of people whose life revolves around finding and using one or multiple drugs.

In relation to the study, the 10-to-13-year-olds would represent the nonusers and experimental users, and the 14-to-18-year-olds would help them understand the regular users, along with the first two.  The last stage, drug-dependent users, was considered “beyond the scope of their project” but they decided that talking with adults could help them understand this group.

I think that dividing people into these four groups is helpful because it segments a large population of people into smaller groups that are easier to analyze and understand.  It provides some standardization and methodology to the large population.  However, there are some cons to this model.  Since there are only four groups I think that some people may not know exactly which they fall into.  I think that there are many different levels of drug use and four groups is not enough.  Also, when they associated the groups with the study, I do not think that they should have discounted the fact that some 10-13 year olds could be in the regular users group, or that 14-18 year olds could be in the drug-dependent individuals group.  I think that these preconceived ideas about the groups could affect the data collected.  

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