Substance Use Research Methods: Ethics, Culture, and Health Equity

Dear Colleagues,

The social marginalization of people who use alcohol or other psychoactive substances, driven by factors such as stigma, discrimination, and the criminalization of substance use, undermines health and wellbeing and is a barrier to health equity, including health service access. Conversely, this social marginalization  is also a barrier to public health practitioners and researchers who are seeking to reduce substance-related harm. People who use substances are often wary of participating in research and disclosing their personal information. This contributes to non-response and response biases, which can undermine the value of substance use research. For example, studies of public health and therapeutic interventions for substance use are hindered by significant loss to follow up [1]. Survey instruments can have inherent biases that impact the validity of the data collected for different groups, including First Nations and other cultural minority populations [2]. Further, a lack of consumer involvement in research design or program delivery may perpetuate deficit views of people who use alcohol or other substances [3]. Innovative and ethical research methods underpin high-quality research, which can support effective public health responses to substance use issues. An important part of this is the participation of people who use substances and peer substance use treatment programs in the design and evaluation of the public health responses intended to support them. This is fundamental for improving program quality and outcomes, and strategies are needed to overcome stigma and discrimination to ensure this can occur effectively and ethically and modify the related social determinants of health over time [4]. This Special Issue is open to any studies of substance use research methods, particularly those that reflect on public health, the behavioral environment, comorbid mental health disorders, risk and treatment for sexually transmitted and other infections, ethics, culture, health equity, and/or consumer participation.

References

1. Stockings, E.; Bartlem, K.; Hall, A.; Hodder, R.; Gilligan, C.; Wiggers, J.; Sherker, S.; Wolfenden, L. Whole-of-community interventions to reduce population-level harms arising from alcohol and other drug use: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Addiction 2018, 113, 1984–2018. https://doi.org/10.1111/add.14277.
2. Weatherall, T.J.; Conigrave, K.M.; Conigrave, J.H.; Lee, K.S.K. What is the prevalence of current alcohol dependence and how is it measured for Indigenous people in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States of America? A systematic review. Sci. Clin. Pract. 2020, 15, 32. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13722-020-00205-7.
3. van der Sterren, A.E.; Nathan, S.; Rawstorne, P.; Yarbakhsh, E.; Gough, C.; Bowles, D. Involvement of people who use alcohol and other drug services in the development of patient-reported measures of experience: a scoping review. Health Expect 2023, 26, 2151–2163. https://doi:10.1111/hex.13829.
4. Goodhew, M.; Stein-Parbury, J.; Dawson, A. Consumer participation in drug treatment: a systematic review. Drugs Alcohol Today 2019, 19, 97–112. https://doi.org/10.1108/DAT-05-2018-0023.

Dr. Andrew Smirnov
Dr. Caroline Salom
Guest Editors

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• substance use
• drug harm reduction
• research methods
• research ethics
• stigma and discrimination
• health equity
• culture and health
• consumer participation
• program design and evaluation
• sampling and measurement