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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Ana M. Ventuneac, MA, Alex Carballo-Diéguez, PhD, Matthew S. Rowe, MPH, Timothy Frasca, MPH, Nuno Nodin, Ivan Balan, PhD, Robert H. Remien, PhD, Peter Lin, PhD, and Curtis Dolezal, PhD. HIV Center for Clinical and Behavioral Studies at New York State Psychiatric Institute and Columbia University, 1051 Riverside Drive, Unit 29, New York, NY 10032, 212-568-4352, amvccny@aol.com

Background: The Internet has become an important venue for recruiting participants in social science research, particularly for HIV-related studies. Yet, Internet recruitment of individuals for face-to-face interviews is particularly challenging. Our study focused on men who have sex with men (MSM) in NYC who use the Internet to meet partners for “bareback” sex. Here we describe three distinct strategies for online recruitment and report on the overall effectiveness of each of these approaches, as well as their limitations.

Methods: The two active recruitment strategies were instant messaging (i.e., real-time chat) and email to Web site users. A third, more passive, approach allowed users to contact study staff directly from an online profile.

Results: During a one-year period, we spent approximately 2,500 hours logged in to the Web sites. We sent 4,910 instant messages, of which 2,627 (53.5 %) were acknowledged. Of the 2,139 email messages that were sent, only 73 (3.4 %) were acknowledged. In addition, 538 Web site users contacted us via our profile (passive strategy). Of all the men we reached, 367 expressed an interest in participating and were screened by telephone. Given our eligibility criteria, only 170 men qualified, of whom 115 men completed a face-to-face interview. (Since recruitment is ongoing through February of 2006, final numbers are likely to change.)

Conclusions: Online recruitment allowed us to cast the wide net needed to meet our recruitment goal. We offer recommendations about ways to maximize the use of the Internet to reach target populations for research studies.

Learning Objectives:

• We describe three distinct strategies for online recruitment of participants in social science research, particularly for HIV-related studies, and report on the overall effectiveness of each of these approaches, as well as their limitations. Participants will learn about ways to maximize the use of the Internet to reach target populations for research studies.

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No