Sociometric Networks among Bushwick Drug Injectors

Summary and Discussion

This chapter has discussed sociometric networks among drug injectors in Bushwick. What stands out in the data presented is a simple point: Sociometric network locations can be measured, and both the behaviors and the personal (egocentric) networks of drug injectors seem to vary by network location. (Although we have shown this only for the sociometric risk network, it is also true for the sociometric social network and the ethnographic social network.) When we examine data on sociometric risk networks, those in the two-core of the large component seem to be at particularly high risk. In the next chapter, we will focus our analysis of the relationship of sociometric network location on the probability of HIV infection on the dichotomy between these two-core members and the other participants in the study.