CONVERSATIONS WITH DRUG-USERS - A FUNCTIONAL DISCOURSE MODEL - THE DERIVATION OF A TYPOLOGY OF DRUG DISCOURSE - AND AN EMPIRICAL-STUDY OF ITS PREDICTIVE USEFULNESS

In the first stage of the study, five-hundred and forty-eight minimall y structured 15 minute conversations were conducted with drug users in South Ayrshire, Glasgow, Lothian and Newcastle upon Tyne. Conversatio ns were cued by a single question (''So what are you using at the mome nt?'') and took their own course thereafter. Each conversation was tap e recorded and each tape recording was transcribed by a typist. A conc eptual framework was developed based on the dimensions purposiveness, hedonism, generalisability, time, reductionism, attribution of addicti on and contradictoriness. A typology of conversations was then identif ied on the basis of judges rating profiles on these six dimensions. Pi lot studies of the reliability of the coding system showed high levels of replicability for this system between three judges. (r : range .77 to .90). The second stage of the study then examined the ways in whic h each of these types of drug conversation emerged in particular setti ngs or with par ticular client groups. Note that no assumptions are ma de about the truth or falsity of the conversations obtained. The study showed that discourses of the types identified distinguished between groups who were in, or not in, treatment and could also distinguish be tween a variety of different patterns of drug use amongst clients both in and out of the treatment context. The implications of the study ar e that particular types of functional discourse, regardless of their s emantic truth, emerge reliably as drug users move through the differen t stages of a drug use career.