Adolescents' Self-Reports of Tobacco, Alcohol, and Marijuana use: Examining the Comparability of Video Tape, Cartoon and Verbal Bogus-Pipeline Procedures

Abstract

Recent studies of smoking prevention have utilized procedures designed to motivate adolescents to provide truthful self-reports by convincing them that their smoking status can be verified by an independent (“bogus”) measure. The current study evaluated the effectiveness of three “bogus-pipeline” procedures hypothesized to increase the validity of self-reported cigarette smoking among 646 seventh graders from two suburban New York City schools. A second aim was to determine the extent to which “bogus-pipeline” procedures targeted specifically at cigarette smoking can indirectly increase the validity of self-reports of alcohol and marijuana use. Over-all, the observed bogus-pipeline effects were modest. Of the three procedures, both the video tape and cartoon presentation modes resulted in a slightly higher percentage of self-reported smoking behavior; only the cartoon presentation mode resulted in a higher percentage of drinking behavior. A reverse effect was observed for self-reported marijuana use in which subjects in the non-bogus-pipeline (control) condition reported significantly more marijuana use than those in the three bogus-pipeline conditions, suggesting overreporting in this population. It appears the validity of adolescents' self-reports may vary from population to population and from behavior to behavior in relation to the perceived social desirability of the specific behavior measured.