Indiana University Adolescent Medicine researchers have successfully used daily dairies as a research tool for the past 15 years. By incorporating social media, such as cellular telephones, into the process, they hope to engage a new generation of adolescents.

"We certainly did not develop the methodology, but we are at the forefront of its use," said Dr. Fortenberry. "Other studies with adults have used cell phones but this is one of the first large-scale studies with teens."

To assure confidentiality and privacy, the Indiana University Division of Biostatistics has developed a program that will synchronize all the responses to a mainframe on the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis campus. The responses will be removed from the cell phones as soon as the teen hits the "send" button.

In addition to Dr. Fortenberry, other Indiana University researchers participating are Sarah Wiehe, M.D., from the Division of Children's Health Services Research; Mary Ott, M.D., from the Division of Adolescent Medicine; Barry Katz, Ph.D., director of biostatistics; Bobbie Van Der Pol, Ph.D., from the Division of Infectious Diseases, and Qunfeng Dong, Ph.D., from bioinformatics at IU-Bloomington. Also participating is George Weinstock, PhD., a molecular geneticist at Washington University in St. Louis.

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