I'm not sure what you mean. If the combo box is bound to Topic ID and you have the query that currently exists as the underlying Rowsource for the combo box, whenever you move between records the combo box will display the text (not the topic id), but the value of the combo box will be the topic id.
It did for me when you change the CONTROL SOURCE of the combo box to TopicID ( just use the drop down to select it). Leave the ROWSOURCE the way it is.
ok, studding carefully then what is the difference between name and userID and topic id and title because the topics one works fine and add the value found to the database were the userID add to the database at 0 always