The Impact of Interviewer Characteristics on Drug Use Reporting by Male Juvenile Arrestees

Abstract

We evaluated the importance of interviewer and subject effects on cocaine and marijuana use disclosure in a sample of over 3,000 male juvenile arrestees. Analyses evaluated the viability of Social Attribution and Conditional Social Attribution models of interviewer effects. The viability of alternative models was investigated in the context of comparative analyses excluding and including statistical adjustments for the clustering of responses by interviewers. Interviewer effects were more salient in models predicting marijuana disclosure than in models predicting cocaine disclosure. Logistic regression analyses provided support for Social Attribution and Conditional Social Attribution models of interviewer effects. Models suggested large interviewer cluster effects. Cluster adjustment altered interpretation of effects for both cocaine and marijuana. Subject race/ethnicity effects were salient in models predicting disclosure for both drugs, but were especially large in models predicting cocaine disclosure.