Por onde anda o que se oculta: o acesso a mundos sociais de consumidores problemáticos de drogas através do método do snowball

Abstract

This article can be divided in three sections. The introduction refers the importance of the snowball method as a resource aimed at drug users, usually excluded by clinical research samples and by psychosociological inquiries. The first section focuses on central notions in a current research on the extension of drugs problematic use in undercover populations. Thus it revises the notions of "problematic use", "undercover population", "social world" and the use of a chain of methods for its study. The second section describes the orientations of that investigation. The goals of the research are divided in two main courses: one, the gathering of extension problematic use indicators of illegal drugs, through the study of specific undercover populations, the other, the throughout examination of a singular drugs use experience by qualitative data.