Writing-up Global Drug Survey 2024 - Thanks for your help, we are now writing up the results!

[Tronica]

EDIT: thanks everyone. Now result writing and will return when we have something to show you

Hello everyone

The 2024 Global Drug Survey launched last week, after taking a year off!

The Global Drug Survey (GDS) is the world's largest survey of drug use. Our aim is to ensure that the voices of those who use drugs are heard and considered in government decision-making processes. We want to make drug use safer for individuals, regardless of the legal status of the substances involved.

This year, the survey delves into current and topical issues in the drug policy space such as drug prices, how individuals’ drug use would change in response to decriminalisation and/or legalisation, illicit tobacco use, use of performance and image-enhancing drugs, nitrous oxide use, perspectives on tobacco endgame policies, and drug use in nightlife and festival settings.

We believe in the power of collective voices, and that's where we need your help.

The anonymous online survey only takes between 20 to 30 minutes to complete and is available in eight languages (English, Danish, Dutch, French, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian and Spanish). Anyone aged 16 or over who has used a drug (including alcohol or tobacco) in the past year is eligible to take part.

Survey link

GDS2024 is hosted on an encrypted survey platform. It's anonymous and confidential. We won't ask you for any personally identifiable details. We do not (and cannot) record your IP address. Your data is stored on secure REDCap servers. More information can be found on the REDCap website in their General Security Overview. GDS2024 has ethics approval from The University of Queensland (2023/HE001927).

We expect data collection to last from now until March 2024, and to provide findings back to the public by around mid 2024.

If you have any questions or need further information, don't hesitate to reach out.

Note: Dr Monica Barratt is part of the GDS team, and is also me, Tronica, so I'll be personally monitoring this thread. Should you have any questions or find any bugs in the survey, just reply here or PM me.

 

[neversickanymore]

just submitted

 

[Tronica]

just submitted

Thanks a lot! Let us know if you have any feedback.

 

[Tronica]

We have fixed a few of the bugs located by people across the world, hopefully none of you were affected.

 

[losthippy]

Done

 

[purplestarr]

Hello everyone

The 2024 Global Drug Survey launched last week, after taking a year off!

The Global Drug Survey (GDS) is the world's largest survey of drug use. Our aim is to ensure that the voices of those who use drugs are heard and considered in government decision-making processes. We want to make drug use safer for individuals, regardless of the legal status of the substances involved.

This year, the survey delves into current and topical issues in the drug policy space such as drug prices, how individuals’ drug use would change in response to decriminalisation and/or legalisation, illicit tobacco use, use of performance and image-enhancing drugs, nitrous oxide use, perspectives on tobacco endgame policies, and drug use in nightlife and festival settings.

We believe in the power of collective voices, and that's where we need your help.

The anonymous online survey only takes between 20 to 30 minutes to complete and is available in eight languages (English, Danish, Dutch, French, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian and Spanish). Anyone aged 16 or over who has used a drug (including alcohol or tobacco) in the past year is eligible to take part.

Survey link

GDS2024 is hosted on an encrypted survey platform. It's anonymous and confidential. We won't ask you for any personally identifiable details. We do not (and cannot) record your IP address. Your data is stored on secure REDCap servers. More information can be found on the REDCap website in their General Security Overview. GDS2024 has ethics approval from The University of Queensland (2023/HE001927).

We expect data collection to last from now until March 2024, and to provide findings back to the public by around mid 2024.

If you have any questions or need further information, don't hesitate to reach out.

Note: Dr Monica Barratt is part of the GDS team, and is also me, Tronica, so I'll be personally monitoring this thread. Should you have any questions or find any bugs in the survey, just reply here or PM me.

Thank you for posting. I have submitted mine & saved site to reference later. Share with others as well. Thank you

 

[whoop22]

Hello everyone

The 2024 Global Drug Survey launched last week, after taking a year off!

The Global Drug Survey (GDS) is the world's largest survey of drug use. Our aim is to ensure that the voices of those who use drugs are heard and considered in government decision-making processes. We want to make drug use safer for individuals, regardless of the legal status of the substances involved.

This year, the survey delves into current and topical issues in the drug policy space such as drug prices, how individuals’ drug use would change in response to decriminalisation and/or legalisation, illicit tobacco use, use of performance and image-enhancing drugs, nitrous oxide use, perspectives on tobacco endgame policies, and drug use in nightlife and festival settings.

We believe in the power of collective voices, and that's where we need your help.

The anonymous online survey only takes between 20 to 30 minutes to complete and is available in eight languages (English, Danish, Dutch, French, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian and Spanish). Anyone aged 16 or over who has used a drug (including alcohol or tobacco) in the past year is eligible to take part.

Survey link

GDS2024 is hosted on an encrypted survey platform. It's anonymous and confidential. We won't ask you for any personally identifiable details. We do not (and cannot) record your IP address. Your data is stored on secure REDCap servers. More information can be found on the REDCap website in their General Security Overview. GDS2024 has ethics approval from The University of Queensland (2023/HE001927).

We expect data collection to last from now until March 2024, and to provide findings back to the public by around mid 2024.

If you have any questions or need further information, don't hesitate to reach out.

Note: Dr Monica Barratt is part of the GDS team, and is also me, Tronica, so I'll be personally monitoring this thread. Should you have any questions or find any bugs in the survey, just reply here or PM me.

Does it pay

 

[neversickanymore]

Does it pay

it’s pays off with important knowledge for humanity

 

[Tronica]

Does it pay

I can see you are looking for paid jobs so this one may not be for you...

However, the issue we have is that the GDS is anonymous for good reason - we don't want to know who people are, as we need to ensure that if collecting information about prohibited activities, we can't have information that police might find useful.

So, we don't pay, so as to keep the survey truly anonymous.

I know there are ways around this - e.g. you input identifying information into a separate screen that is not linked to your responses to the survey. But even holding that information - given the content of the GDS - could be considered incriminating for many people.

It's hard, because more and more, people aren't completing surveys for free due to the large number of paid opportunities.

But I know when I do paid surveys or join panels, it's incredibly identifying - I mean, they need your bank details, your date of birth, a lot of information about you - that's to ensure you are gaming the system (well, to attempt to counteract that).

I don't think many people would feel comfortable with that level of identification associated with their own drug use.

But if we pay people and don't collect identifying information, then people just milk the survey for money and give us invalid information. E.g. 1 person does it 100 times pretending to be different people to get cash.

I wish there was a better solution

 

[Thomas Davie]

Participated and submitted. Pretty easy-peasy lemon squeasy

Tom

 

[Tronica]

Participated and submitted. Pretty easy-peasy lemon squeasy

Tom

Thanks a lot, we did try to make it quicker this year!

 

[Thomas Davie]

Thanks a lot, we did try to make it quicker this year!

You could have made it 4 times as long and I still would have enjoyed filling it out.

Tom, yeah I like filling forms out

 

[ewcopp22]

Completed!

 

[Tronica]

You could have made it 4 times as long and I still would have enjoyed filling it out.

Tom, yeah I like filling forms out

I also love forms but I think we are in the minority

 

[Jen X]

Done

 

[tryptakid]

Completed - wondering if I found a confederate response to one of the questions....

 

[Tronica]

Completed - wondering if I found a confederate response to one of the questions....

Thanks for completing. Not sure what you mean by "a confederate response"?

 

[tryptakid]

Thanks for completing. Not sure what you mean by "a confederate response"?

There was a substance listed that.... I've never heard of and doesn't result with anything via a websearch. I may be using the wrong term, but I meant a response that would indicate that the respondent is not answering honestly (for example, if I said I had used something that doesn't actually exist, it might suggest that I"m not honestly answering other questions).

The term confederate is used to describe research variables that deceive on behalf of furthering the purposes of a study - like someone who appears to be a participant but is actually a member of the research team.

 

[Tronica]

There was a substance listed that.... I've never heard of and doesn't result with anything via a websearch. I may be using the wrong term, but I meant a response that would indicate that the respondent is not answering honestly (for example, if I said I had used something that doesn't actually exist, it might suggest that I"m not honestly answering other questions).

The term confederate is used to describe research variables that deceive on behalf of furthering the purposes of a study - like someone who appears to be a participant but is actually a member of the research team.

Yes, we included a fake drug.
I'm glad we did include it, as I just downloaded the dataset yesterday and did a quick look at the existing data and we have almost 200 people say they had used it.
Yes, we do remove anyone who says they have consumed the fake drug. While they may not be deliberately lying, it's likely they aren't properly reading the survey.
I know it is also possible that they made a mistake in clicking that drug, but it does demonstrate they may lack reliability more broadly as respondents.

 

[tryptakid]

Yes, we included a fake drug.
I'm glad we did include it, as I just downloaded the dataset yesterday and did a quick look at the existing data and we have almost 200 people say they had used it.
Yes, we do remove anyone who says they have consumed the fake drug. While they may not be deliberately lying, it's likely they aren't properly reading the survey.
I know it is also possible that they made a mistake in clicking that drug, but it does demonstrate they may lack reliability more broadly as respondents.

Totally reasonable thing to do, especially when the uncanny valley between human responses and non-human has begun to shrink considerably. I will say that it took me a moment when I was re-reading the list and double checking (Maybe it's a street name somewhere and just not in the US?), it's a good fake name to go with.