Dr Sylvie C. Tourigny
Dr Tourigny had a first career as a paralegal, working on death row appeals
and criminal defence teams. She has an academic background in sociology and
women studies, with an MBA, a joint PhD in Community Medicine and Medical
Social Psychology, and postdoctoral training in Research Ethics from the
American Association for the Advancement of Sciences. She was also a Senior
Postdoctoral Fellow of the USA's National Institute on Drug Abuse in
HIV/AIDS and Substance Abuse Research, housed at the National Development
Research Institutes, Inc., in New York City, from 1996 to1999.

She has extensive ethnographic experience negotiating field relationships
with populations known to be difficult to enlist, and problematic to retain,
in research projects. She spent five years conducting research in Detroit
ghettos, where her focus included the development of drug dealing amongst
urban gangs. She was first to document intentional HIV exposure amongst
urban youths in a peer reviewed journal , and formally notified NIDA of what
was then an emergent phenomenon: the requirement that gang initiates
self-inject or inject others with HIV-infected syringes, as part of a gang
initiation. This contributed to a significant gang policing intervention
initiative.

She has conducted research amongst gang members as drug dealers, has worked
with heroin importers in Australia, and has considerable credibility amongst
poly drug users and front line workers. Yet, she also sustains significant
corporate and public sector networks, having successfully enlisted the
support and endorsement of Queensland Police Service and Queensland
Corrections for her academic management efforts.

Dr. Tourigny spent her first four years in Australia as Founding Director of
Behavioural Studies, at The University of Queensland. Her directorship
ended in March 2003, at which point she became affiliated with the
Queensland Alcohol and Drug Research and Education Centre. She also teaches
courses in Health Communication, and Drugs in Everyday Life, in the School
of Social Science.