Finding Out Buyer Behavior

Warning: Drug use and foster care are touchy subjects that are discussed in this assignment.

For this assignment, I chose to interview homeless individuals that have specific keywords on the signs that they hold. I did have to drive around the city to find these people but I am pretty happy with the outcome. I chose people who had the words hungry, have kids, and need work on their signs. I chose these because I think that it's these people who are in the most need for resources. Those who have to provide for their own kids or those who desperately want to work have more motivation than others to go find work.

In my interviews, I asked very general questions that allowed for the interviewee to tell me their story. For this, I just listened and took notes. I asked questions like "when did you lose housing?" "how many kids do you have?" "When was your last job" and each of the three people I interviewed was very cooperative. I could tell that two of them were not in good shape, had bruises all over them and signs of drug use.

Overall, these three people had similar outcomes to very different experiences. Each of them found themselves homeless but due to many different reasons. One, like I've been wanting to interview, was a retired veteran who lost his retirement funding as well as contact with his family due to unfortunate circumstances. I asked him when he realized he needed to ask for work instead of just money and he said "Honey, ever since I got out on the streets I knew something needed to happen. Problem is, once people see that you're on the street they don't trust you anymore and look down on you." This broke my heart. It's one of the things that I included in my idea napkin about having faith in people. I got similar answers from the other two just not as emotional. The other two said that they both had been addicted to drugs and because of that, don't have contact with their family. They also described that due to their drug usage they have been in many different bad situations on the streets. I asked them when they realized they needed to ask for work and they said that because of their drug habits, they need to take drugs to function properly. They described that it's not about the high but just getting out of bed in the morning to not get sick. They both do have kids, all of who I found out are actually either in foster care or with family (who they don't contact). They both said they are trying to get work in order to get housing and hopefully get into a program so that once they're clean they can try to get their kids back.

Overall, I think that the need awareness happens when they want to make a change in themselves. Once they realize how bad of a place they're in, they want to change for the better. Need awareness is a tricky subject for those who are homeless because many of them have many different intentions. I think that for the most part, those who recognize the need to get out of the situation are often looking for something else that comes with getting off the street. With my program, I think that these individuals have the potential to really turn their lives around.