not really my business but I'm not sure this is the appropriate place for your request highway dave. perhaps spending the money on a classified might be a better idea.....

I'm certainly not meaning to break any rules, just trying to reach the appropriate subject group for my study, and in this day and age, internet message groups tend to be alot more effective. But if that violates any of your policies, please feel free to remove it with my apologies.

-David Frank

Dave, calling your inquiry "spam" had nothing to do with the validity of it, just that it was solicitous in nature (like a nuisance email that you never asked for) and does not fit the intended purpose of this board. This is supposed to be a safe place for people to share in recovery with each other, not a convenient place for you to find guinea pigs for your college studies. This is basic message board etiquette. Suppose you belonged to a wannabe doctors message board and I came in there wanting to recruit you and others to participate in a study about how doctors are notoriously poor managers of their personal finances (which is true by the way) or a study on how cheap doctors tend to be, when it comes to dealing with Remodeling Contractors, or how they tend to arrogantly assume that they are quite knowledgeable about every subject or field of expertise...well, you get the idea. Someone had a good idea, why not advertise and offer to pay people to participate, that usually works.

I certainly respect your views and as I mentioned have no intention of breaking any site rules or decorum. Unfortunatley to some extent that's how we have to recruit subjects on any issue - but especially when dealing a sensitive population. I could offer to pay people, but that becomes a question of bias that I wanted to avoid - though I'm not understanding how a paid ad would be any different since it would presumably also have to be in either a publication or website catering to that particular community.

As a long-time member of the recovery community myself, I certainly want to express that I'm not trying to take advantage of anyone, but am a firm believer in drawing nesesary attention to drug treatment issues. Studies such as this are part of how policy is created and in my opinion an important aspect of changing some long-standing myths - worthy of the occasionally uncomfortable job I have to preform. I'm not sure why your framing the potential results of the study as somehow reflecting negatively on you - since I have no data yet, I clearly have no conclusions.

In summation, all social researchers to some extend have to be solitious - I don't deny it, but recognize it as a nessesary evil in the course of the research I've been doing. Certainly no one is complelled to participate (and that would bias the study anyway) but if anyone does want to, they can feel free to contact me, anonymously - thats why message boards work well. As to the individual who claims we've been researched to death, that's certainly anyone's right to believe and express, however, others in the community feel differently and should be given a voice if they so choose.

Certainly, I'll respect this site's etiquette, but I would have had no way of knowing that, as this is a very common means of subject recruitment, that researchers employ all the time (and that I had to have pre-approved by DePaul's Internal Review Board) - and yes, on sites catering to addition issues too. Anyway, don't take it personally and if you remove the post, I won't either. Thanks.
-David Frank