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Audience research in the time of COVID-19

2020-04-17T15:43:14+00:00

Research team observing handwashing practices in Accham, Nepal in early 2019 to inform a recent WASH project

At �鶹Լ�� Media Action, audiences are at the heart of everything we do. To understand our audiences and our impact, our work begins and ends with research – and this remains true even in a time of crisis.

As we respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, research helps us to understand our audiences’ perceptions and concerns relating to the disease, as well as what information they need to make decisions and keep their families safe. This in turn enables our production teams to produce trusted, clear and actionable media and communication content that reaches people – including vulnerable communities – at scale, stands out in a sea of competing information (not all of which is true or helpful), and ultimately saves lives.

But how can research teams continue their vital work when they’re working at a distance from production colleagues, when the pace of production is so fast, and when face-to-face field work is out of the question?

Adapting our pre-testing methods

It can be difficult to keep pace with the need for rapid programme development when it comes to producing COVID-19 communications content. But it’s not good enough to say ‘we don’t have time to test’. You might get a piece of content on air or online more quickly – but the impact may be lost if the tone isn’t culturally appropriate, language about physical distancing too confusing, or your call to action is not clear enough for audiences.

So our message is simple: wherever possible, ‘pre-test, pre-test, pre-test’.

There are ways of gaining quick feedback under lockdown. Whilst working from home, our research team in Myanmar recently conducted some pre-testing of one of our new COVID-19 public service announcements (PSA) with their friends and families. They found that respondents could recall the key information points from the PSA – about washing your hands and covering your face when coughing – and felt it was particularly engaging because of the traditional music and lively delivery, making it unique from more serious PSAs they had seen on other media platforms. They recommended that the production team continue with this positive, encouraging tone to engage audiences.

A scene from one of our COVID-19 public service announcements in Myanmar

Inspired by this example, our research team in Indonesia are also testing content with friends and family via telephone and social media, as well as getting back in touch with a group of young people who recently took part in qualitative research about climate change. They’re setting up closed Facebook groups through which they can pre-test content, such as short new radio dramas tackling COVID-19 misinformation and rumours, to receive rapid feedback. It’s a similar story in Afghanistan, where we’re using social media to recruit volunteers for online focus group discussions. We’re currently exploring new ways to pre-test, such as contacting respondents and playing content via mobile.

Utilising local networks and contacts

With field work limited by local restrictions on movement, we’re relying on our wide-reaching networks and contacts nurtured over the years to help us access respondents and continue our vital research – to ensure programming reflects people’s changing needs.

For example, in Zambia, we’re working closely with our national network of community journalists – developed through years of work strengthening community radio in the country – to help us understand the needs and concerns of hard-to-reach audiences. We’re looking to set up simple, safe and physically distant mobile surveys for them to run in their communities to help us understand how perceptions of, and concerns about, the pandemic differ across rural and urban areas.

Similarly, in Bangladesh, where access to Cox’s Bazar refugee camp is now restricted, our researchers are making regular phone calls to our network of Rohingya volunteers to continue taking the pulse of the community. We’re sharing the insights gained – including persistent, widely circulating COVID-19 rumours and how to counter them – through our longstanding ‘What Matters?’ bulletin in partnership with Translators Without Borders.

And in Cambodia, where our researchers had been in the midst of a panel evaluation for our popular youth project Klahan9 (Brave 9), we’re pivoting the focus of our research to include perceptions on COVID-19. The team is also exploring how to draw upon our network of Klahan9 youth ambassadors to tell us more about how they and their communities are experiencing the pandemic.

The �鶹Լ�� Media Action Data Portal - an open source portal containing a wealth of our existing audience research

Revisiting our existing data and building partnerships

To respect our audiences, it’s important that we use our existing insights relevant to COVID-19 and not conduct research for the sake of it.

Many of our teams around the world have been looking carefully at our wealth of existing audience research (much of which is open source and available on our website and Data Portal), re-analysing the data to draw out new insights around media access and usage among vulnerable audiences such as older people or people with disabilities. We’re also pulling out useful data from previous projects around health and hygiene – for instance, barriers to, and enablers of, good water, sanitation and hygiene practices in Nepal, Kenya and Ethiopia.

Externally, we are building relationships with organisations across key sectors (including market research, academic and humanitarian) which are producing surveys and collecting useful insights on COVID-19 – such as ACAPs, Innovations for Poverty Action, Kantar and the International Survey on Coronavirus, for information relevant to our projects.

Cross-country collaboration

Despite restrictions around freedom of movement, researchers at our London headquarters and across our network of country offices are working more closely than ever before – sharing expertise, exchanging COVID-19 research tips and tricks, and comparing cultural insights through regular calls and online forums. And we’re supporting our country offices virtually from London to better analyse their digital performance and monitor online chatter about the pandemic – using tools such as Crowdtangle’s COVID-19 tracking to help production teams fine-tune their outputs.

Encouragingly, there are early signs that our work is paying off. Some of the COVID-19 PSAs produced by our Myanmar team, for instance, are achieving record levels of online engagement. The Ministry of Health has even asked to make this PSA (watched nearly 3 million times and shared by 46,000+ people) official, for broadcast through national TV partners.

The situation is changing rapidly. But we will continue to innovate and review research methodologies to ensure we’re providing essential insights to production colleagues, and best serving our audiences.

The potential of reforming state broadcasters in divided societies: advancing an unfashionable argument

2015-10-30T14:40:34+00:00

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's Director of Policy and Learning argues for an urgent rethinking of what is often considered a relic of the past - the state broadcaster - to encourage discussion, dialogue and understanding across communities in fragile states.

Most commentaries on 21st-century media focus on the impact of new technologies, social media and, above all, the increasing global ubiquity of mobile telephony Such commentaries highlight how in many, if not most, societies, the majority of people are under the age of 30 and are reinventing how humanity communicates with itself. The focus is on innovation, on digital replacing analogue, on an old order of mass, vertical forms of communication being supplanted by horizontal, digitally enabled networks.

Speaking personally, I have advanced at one time or another all these tenets and continue (mostly) to do so. This blog, however, marks the publication of a set of �鶹Լ�� Media Action policy and research outputs I’ve commissioned which collectively advance some unfashionable arguments.

We focus particularly on the role of media in fragile and divided societies and especially on what can be done to support media that transcends, rather than exacerbates, divisions in society. We argue that, for all the innovation, dynamism and potential that exists, there are growing signs that publics are less and less trusting of the media that is available to them. Media environments appear more dynamic, interactive and complex, but much of media – both traditional and social – exists to advance particular agendas or interests in society rather than to serve a public. 21st-century fragmentation of media environments has often been accompanied by an associated fracturing of media often owned, controlled or heavily influenced by particular political, factional, ethnic or religious interests. Such fracturing often applies to both social and traditional media.

National debate

As one response, we revisit the potential in fragile and divided states of a set of institutions understandably considered relics of a monolithic, analogue, ageing past – the state broadcaster. We suggest that traditional state broadcasters – which we describe as often “too biased to trust but too big to ignore” – could provide a critical platform for national public debate in divided societies. For that to happen, they would need to transform themselves into genuinely independent 21st-century public service media organisations capable of being digitally agile, trusted and appealing to all in society (especially the young). Such a process we acknowledge presents formidable political, as well as technical difficulties. Despite the scale of the challenge, however, we argue that such a function is becoming increasingly important and increasingly urgent.

None of this is designed to justify reigning in or discouraging other forms of commercial, community, online or other media. Such media produce pluralistic, vibrant, often muscular debate providing the essential threads making up the fabric of healthy democratic societies. We believe that freedom of expression is as important now as it has ever been and we are actively opposed to attempts to control or censor.

But sometimes, especially in fragile and divided societies, our analysis suggests 21st-century media systems can foster greater division in society, making it more difficult for people from different faiths, ethnicities or politics to get on with each and get on with their lives. Greater attention needs to be paid to media that encourages discussion, dialogue and understanding across communities in divided societies, not just within them.

New analysis

We have already published several briefings that have examined these issues. Fragile States: the role of media and communication drew on more detailed analyses from Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Kenya and Pakistan to track the often extraordinary economic and political contributions of media but also the growing fragmentation and co-option of both traditional and social media by factional interests. It flagged an increasingly urgent concern that some media was driving division, political polarisation and sometimes hate and that international support strategies appeared not to be reacting to these concerns. It also highlighted the many positive roles of media in the 21st century.

We published After the Revolution: Libya and Tunisia through the people’s eyes, a research report based on the kind of detailed, quantitative data that has only rarely recently been conducted in post -Arab uprising countries. It demonstrated a clear reduction in trust in a media that publics had become increasingly convinced existed to tell them what to do and think for the benefits of their owners or backers, rather than one that sought to inform and enable them to navigate the extraordinary turbulent sea of political transition.

We have just published two policy briefings examining the prospects of supporting media systems that are trusted, universal (reaching all parts of a society and reflecting the concerns of all sections of society), balanced and fundamentally focused on serving a public, rather than any other political, economic or factional interest.

The first is Relic or Renaissance? Public Service Media in the 21st Century, by the former Director of News at the �鶹Լ�� World Service, Phil Harding. Some of the many people interviewed for the report argued that the concept should be consigned to an analogue dustbin of history. Phil argues that, while the concept needs to be entirely modernised, the role of an independent, trusted, national, universally available media entity whose sole focus is to serve its audience and work in the public, rather than governmental or factional interest, could not be more relevant.

The second briefing is After the Arab Uprisings: The Prospects for Citizen Engagement through National Media. written by Alexandra Buccianti and Sarah El Richani. The briefing examines the relationship between media developments and the complex politics and social dynamics in four countries: Egypt, Lebanon, Libya and Tunisia. It concludes that the still mostly unreformed state broadcasters are working in the interests of their governments, rather than their people but if they can be reformed to become genuinely independent of government, they could provide a critical source of both social cohesion and political freedom.

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"I want to go to university to become a doctor"

2015-10-09T13:29:53+00:00

The theme for this year's International Day of the Girl Child is the power of the adolescent girl and the vision for this generation of girls in 2030. As the day approaches, Apune Jacob Alfred reflects on the research he and colleagues at �鶹Լ�� Media Action have undertaken as part of the Girls’ Education programme in South Sudan.

"[I want to go to university] so that I can become a doctor and drive my own car.”
Adolescent girl, Ngomba, western South Sudan

This was just one ambition we heard earlier this year when we conducted interviews with teenage girls for �鶹Լ�� Media Action's Our School project, part of the DFID-funded Girls’ Education programme in South Sudan. In total, we spoke to 13 girls aged 13 to 18. Having a daughter myself, it was wonderful to hear about how interested these teenagers were to become doctors or engineers and become equal to any man in South Sudan.

We were working in Wau, Western Bahr El Ghazal, in the west of South Sudan on what’s called a longitudinal qualitative study which involves us speaking to girls, their families, teachers and key influencers in their community over a four-year period.

As the quote suggests, a key finding from our research is that this generation of women have big ambitions and hopes for their futures. However, in 2013, only 32% of those enrolled in secondary school were girls. Many of the girls in our study, despite being teenagers, were either not in school or were still in the lower grades of primary school.

What causes this gulf between ambition and reality?

Our study aims to understand better the drivers and barriers that influence girls’ opportunities in relation to education and, consequently, what they are able to choose to do in their lives.

Many of the adolescent girls we spoke to talked about a number of issues affecting their ability to go and stay in school. They told us about the pressure of domestic responsibilities, the expense of education – not only school fees, but also the price of uniforms, books and pens. Parents and others in the community also mentioned the harassment girls sometimes face from boys and men inside and outside of school.

“Life has been hard. Had it not been because of money problems, I would have got registered in school. So… these are the things that pain me.” Adolescent girl, Kayango, western South Sudan

Informing programmes

The findings from our research directly feed into Our School, a 15-minute factual radio programme that includes real-life stories of girls, their families and schools to highlight the benefits of girls staying in school.

Recent episodes of the programme have directly tackled some of the main challenges the girls told us about.

For example, the show has focused on how to grow and manage income and expenditure in the household to help budget for school fees, how to split household chores among girls and boys equally and how girls can deal with boys inside and outside of the classroom.

Next year we will be returning to the same girls, families and teachers to see if and how their situations have changed – and what has contributed to these changes. I’m very much looking forward to going back and meeting the girls again so I can see for myself how they have progressed in their ambitions, and if and how the Our School programme is helping them.

Read the UNICEF news report on South Sudan Girls’ Education Strategy 2015-2017

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A girl without education is like a bird without wings

2015-08-12T11:00:00+00:00

AIC Nursery and Primary School celebrating South Sudan’s National Girls’ Education Day

In a country where only one in ten girls complete primary education, Trish Doherty looks at how a �鶹Լ�� Media Action radio programme is helping more girls stay in school in South Sudan.

“A girl without education is like a bird without wings”

So read the banner held by pupils of AIC Nursery and Primary School as they marched onto the pitch set aside for the celebrations of South Sudan’s National Girls’ Education Day. Held at Gudele East Primary School, the event was both a celebration of girls’ education and the launch of the first ever South Sudan Girls’ Education Strategy.

In a country where only one in ten girls complete primary education and even fewer a secondary education, the strategy’s emphasis on girls’ education is paramount.

Launched by the government with support from UNICEF and key education organisations, the strategy aims to remove barriers that prevent girls in South Sudan from going to and staying in school and includes plans to promote girls’ education, make education affordable and provide a gender sensitive curriculum.

Transforming lives through education

Watching the children of primary schools from across the area perform songs, dances and dramas about the challenges they face in going to and staying in school, and the pride they have in their own education, I reflected on the changes that �鶹Լ�� Media Action’s Our School radio programme is making to lives of people across South Sudan. Our School is a 15 minute factual radio programme that includes real life stories of girls, their families and schools to highlight the benefits of girls staying in education. The show forms part of the Girls Education South Sudan project, which seeks to transform the lives of a generation of children – especially girls – through education.

In 2014, within four months of its first broadcast, Our School reached an estimated 946,000 people aged 15+ in South Sudan. Since then we have seen real stories of change among listeners. For example, 19 year old William Okeny from Juba, who, after hearing the Our School programme, said he changed his attitude towards the division of household chores:

“One time I tune on my radio it was Our School programme and the topic was supporting girls at home… it was really touches me [and] encourages me to come up with a choice of helping my sisters at home with everything like cooking, sweeping [and] mopping.”

William talks about how 'Our School' inspired him to help his sister around the house, to help her concentrate on her school work.

Or 19 year old Teresa Mading from Kuajock, who, at 15, dropped out of school when she got married and had a family. Listening to Our School programme some years after the birth of her first child, Teresa was inspired to return to school.

“I first talked to my husband [and told him] that I had listened to the one of young mothers like me explaining over [the] radio that she had taken courage and returned to school while having young children like me.”

As pupils at the National Girls’ Education Day celebrations performed a drama on the importance of girls staying in school for themselves and their families, I noted how similar their fictional storylines were to William and Teresa’s real-life stories, and how much of a difference education will make for future generations.

Related links:

Visit the Girls Education South Sudan (GESS) project website
Read the UNICEF news report on South Sudan Girls’ Education Strategy 2015-2017
Read more about �鶹Լ�� Media Action's work in South Sudan
Follow �鶹Լ�� Media Action on Twitter and Facebook
Go back to the �鶹Լ�� Media Action website

A fictional death that saves real lives

2015-04-08T10:39:39+00:00

In a crowded, dusty camp for displaced people in Somalia, Ibrahim and Raho are doing their best to raise two children. When their baby falls ill with diarrhoea, traditional birth attendant Raho treats her with the cures handed down over generations, refusing modern oral rehydration solution (ORS) and zinc treatments. Sadly, their baby dies – another grim statistic from Somalia, where health indicators are amongst the worst in the world – another tragic and preventable infant death from diarrhoea, one of the world’s biggest child killers. The couple’s grief is real and intense.

Except that Ibrahim, Raho and their baby were fictional characters in �鶹Լ�� Media Action’s radio drama broadcast across Somalia. Part of a bigger radio programme – Tiraarka Qoyska (Pillars of the Family) that also included a factual magazine segment, the drama was designed to give families the information they needed to keep young children healthy and well nourished.

Fictional tragedies

And it seems to have worked. Our research found that people who listened to the programme knew more than non-listeners about how to prevent and treat children’s illnesses and practised what they learned. The storylines in which babies died seemed to be particularly effective – listeners most recalled these fictional tragedies and were more likely than non-listeners to change how they cared for sick children.

Life-saving treatment

Dehydration can be a dangerous side effect of diarrhoea so giving extra fluid to an ill baby is especially important. In Somaliland, 39% of mothers who listened to the programme and 43% of regular listeners (people who listened to at least every other episode) boosted both their breastfeeding and giving fluids to a child with diarrhoea as opposed to only one in five mothers who didn’t listen to the programme – a significant difference.

And even though a diarrhoeal baby (over six months old) may be “off its food” it is also vital to keep trying to replenish lost nourishment. Our research found that there was some mistaken belief that food and drink should be reduced for sick babies. While just a quarter of non-listener mothers said that they continued to give their children food when they had diarrhoea, 43% of regular listeners did so. Just over half of mothers who didn’t listen to the programme gave potentially life-saving ORS treatment to their child with diarrhoea, 65% of listeners used ORS.

The fictional treatment of infant death almost never made it into the programme. Writers were asked to create a compelling drama that focused on six priority behaviours to support child health. When the producer tried to persuade the writing team to add child deaths into the scripts, they initially refused, thinking that such storylines would be too upsetting. Finally, he persuaded them that killing fictional babies could save real babies’ lives.

And the message seems to have got through. As one young Somali mother said:

“They [the characters] were talking about who is better – the baby who was given the breast at first or the one who is not, and that the one who was given the breast is healthier and gets more protein than the other. I have taken this opinion and will use it if God wills.”

Related links:

Read the research briefing: How can radio drama improve child health and nutrition in Somalia?
Read more Somalia blogs
Follow �鶹Լ�� Media Action on Facebook and Twitter
Go back to �鶹Լ�� Media Action website

Making a difference: community co-operation in Kenya

2014-12-10T11:08:05+00:00

A girl attends class in Kibera, Kenya

Academics have been mulling over the tricky term "collective efficacy" for decades. Collective, what? Well, exactly. In its essence, collective efficacy is the belief that taking action with others can make a positive change. But I learned last week that if you want to really get to the bottom of what collective efficacy looks like in practice, Kenya is the place to find out.

Through our governance programming, we hope to make people feel more confident about coming together with others to make a difference. So I spent a week in Nairobi, conducting interviews with people from across the city to find out what this elusive concept looks like on the ground. And they told us a lot.

Sitting in the office in London before I left, we ummed and ahhed about what we thought collective efficacy meant and whether we could think of examples of when people in Britain had united to find solutions to local or national problems. And it’s safe to say that while we struggled a little, the Nairobians we spoke to had no such difficulty.

Working together

The first interview was with Diana, a 30 year-old community volunteer from Embakasi in the south of Nairobi. At the start of the interview she described how she didn’t consider herself qualified to participate in politics as she had no formal education. But it soon became clear that this could not be further from the truth. She spoke with passion about how she had organised a discussion in her community on why so few girls were attending school. They discovered that even though primary education is free, many schools were charging enrolment fees, which was deterring families from sending their daughters to school. Diana and others from the community went straight to local head teachers and successfully persuaded them not to charge pupils for enrolling. Her experiences of community activism meant she had enormous faith in her community’s capacity to find solutions to its problems by working together; “One hand cannot clap by itself”, she asserted; “but when two hands join together, we can be heard”.

Next John, an artist from Makadara, described how high youth unemployment is causing many young people in his community to turn to drugs. He explained how the community had mobilised as one to reach out to young people and talk to them about the dangers of drug use. When I asked him what it meant to him to work together, he replied; “It’s about having the will power, after you have known the problem, you don't just sit there, you take action and you improve things”.

It became clear to me that there is lot of confidence in Kenyans’ compassion and capacity to react to problems, as Diana explained; “When something happens, Kenyans run there to help”.

Hearing but not listening

However, faith in their fellow Kenyans is not always mirrored by faith in their leaders to react to them. Mary, a student from Kibera, explained; “There is listening and there is hearing. They would hear us […] but listening means they will take action and make the changes. It doesn't happen most often.”

Jennifer, an unemployed young woman from Embakasi spoke about the need to push leaders to react; “Our leaders like working under pressure so if you just talk they don't listen. But if you do demonstrations, they show interest” she said.

In fact, as well as putting pressure on leaders, in many cases, communities were organising to solve social problems, such as crime, and deliver services, like waste management, themselves and bypassing official channels.

From what I heard in a short trip, it sounds like Kenyans know a lot about how to work collectively to get results. But while the people we spoke to felt that working collectively increased the chances of them being listened to by leaders; it was clear their demands may sometimes fall on deaf ears. This raises the next big question: when people come together to raise concerns, what role can the media play in making politicians respond?

�鶹Լ�� Media Action research.

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The power of the media in Nigeria

2014-11-27T14:44:04+00:00

I could never have predicted a conversation overheard in my cab to work would have such an impact on me. But as we drew to a halt in one of Abuja’s frequent traffic jams, I heard my driver make a call that got me thinking about the increasing power of media in Nigeria – and people’s confidence in it to make a difference.

My driver had taken the opportunity to pick up his mobile and complain to a friend about a wrong that had been done to him. But it wasn’t his complaints about the offending party that made me sit up. It was his comment that if the issue wasn’t resolved, he’d report the case to a popular daily radio show.

My driver isn’t alone in his confidence in the media as a way to address problems.

One survey our research team conducted in 2012 found that more than half - 57% - of the survey participants who had watched or listened to our programmes, felt that they could air their views in the media without fear, and that their views were well represented in the media.

What’s more, another of our surveys found that the majority of people we spoke to also believed that the Nigerian media is playing an important role and providing opportunities for citizens to hold their leaders to account.

What was particularly encouraging to our team was the fact that one of our radio programmes, Talk Your Own- Make Naija Better, seemed to be having a really positive impact in this direction.

Our research showed that approximately every eight out of 10 people who regularly listened to the programme agreed that Talk Your Own plays a role in holding government to account.

An interview for the �鶹Լ�� Media Action radio programme Talk Your Own

Regular listeners also agreed that the programme informs citizens about the decisions and actions of the government (88%) as well as provides an opportunity for people like them to question government officials about their decisions and actions (79%).

In another study where we spoke to listeners in a focus group discussion setting, they gave us diverse examples of Talk Your Own’s impact on their lives, including how the programme increased their knowledge, changed their perceptions - and inspired them to act.

For example, a male listener in a rural part of Enugu state said he had learned a lot about government accounting from the programme: "Before, I believed that once you are a governor, you could eat [ie embezzle] public funds, and when you leave office nobody will chase you. But from the programme, I have learned that if you do that, an agency is there to catch you."

A female listener from an urban area in Nigeria’s capital Abuja, told us how the programme changed her attitude and actions towards corruption: "My mom was looking for a job for my elder brother and there was a certain time she paid money for it. But when I listened to Talk Your Own I told her that was wrong and we have stopped paying bribes."

The purpose of public service broadcasting is to “inform, educate and entertain”. Judging from our research, I think we could add one more: “empower!”

Related links

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's work in Nigeria

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's work on governance and rights

Follow �鶹Լ�� Media Action on Twitter and Facebook

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Proving the impact of media on behaviour change

2014-06-20T14:20:30+00:00

The expectations and excitement levels among our research and learning team here at �鶹Լ�� Media Action were high. The largest single study using a randomised control trial (RCT) to investigate media impact has published midline results online last month. Had the company behind the trial, Development Media International, cracked the Holy Grail and isolated the impact of media on behaviour change? Could these results from their trial in Burkino Faso begin to answer the questions of attribution which trouble the impact evaluation of health communications while resonating through the halls of our donors? Our team couldn’t wait to jump into the detail of the data and explore the initial results.

But while DMI’s conclusion of the findings is exciting – that this is “the first randomised controlled trial to demonstrate that mass media can cause behaviour change”– their three-page report and one-page summary left us wanting more.

While neatly summarised for a policy level audience, we couldn’t help but ask, where are the technical appendices, where is the data, where are the standard errors and, ultimately, what does all this mean for us as a sector? This is why we contacted DMI and their research partners at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. We are pleased to learn a more detailed technical report is being finalised and to be published in the upcoming months.

A rare condition for a unique study

In DMI’s film about the study, they state that there are few countries and media environments around the world that would provide the necessary conditions for this type of study. A principal issue is ‘contamination’, where some people who are not supposed to hear the broadcast (the ‘control group’) are, in fact, exposed to it.

The limited number of suitable countries to work in is in keeping with findings on impact evaluation approaches in health communication from scholars in the sector, such as Jane Bertrand and Robert Hornik. They have underscored the need for alternative study designs to randomised trials as the optimal means of evaluating full coverage mass-media programming. It is largely seen not to be viable to assign subjects randomly to treatment groups when the intervention consists of a full coverage campaign aiming to reach the largest possible audience.

This highlights the uniqueness of their Burkino Faso study and why the results – positive or negative –have such potentially large implications for our sector’s evidence base.

Up until now, the media for development sector has focused on less robust evaluation methods to explore how mass media contributes to improved knowledge and behaviour. And while all evaluations, qualitative and quantitative, build towards a more informed answer, the Burkina Faso trial is pushing the envelope by applying an, in our sector, untried research methodology that should give us more conclusive results.

But to be able to learn the most from DMI’s trial in Burkina Faso and interpret its results correctly, it is vital we get more information on the following aspects, which we hope would be addressed in the upcoming publication.

Theory of change

An important issue where we would like to gain more insight is the Theory of Change that underlies DMI’s intervention in Burkino Faso.

How are their short, high-intensity broadcasts expected to impact behaviour, and more importantly lower child mortality rates?

From the list of outcomes targeted it appears that the trial focused on curative, one-off behaviours and less on those that are underpinned by social norms. People will have more incentive to alter their behaviour if their child is sick, but will be less inclined to change if they feel their family or community would disapprove.

It would also be interesting to learn more about the quality and nature of the programmes: how similar or different are they, what are the editorial values, has any assessment of quality been done? Knowing the Theory of Change and relevant programme information would help us to look beyond the results and understand not only if we see impact, but why.

Dose response

Similar questions apply to the presented dose response results. ‘Dose response’ refers to the period of time each message was broadcasted and the possible relation this has with behaviour outcomes, ie do behaviours that aired for more weeks show more change?

Only a selection of outcomes is taken to present the effect of dose response and a diverse set at that. This affects the interpretability of the results.

Another way of presenting the dose response would have been to group those behaviours that are similar together. It is safe to say, that it is easier for people to take Oral Rehydration Solution (ORS) against diarrhoea than to install a latrine in their house; we expect to see higher differences in one outcome than the other.

Breaking the dose response down according to type of behaviour could have resolved that and provided more insight. Though these midline results give an indication, based on what is currently presented it is difficult to say what the real influence of dose response is.

Research design

Without further technical insight or Theory of Change to turn to, the midline report leaves us with some questions about the study design.

These pertain for instance to technical issues like confidence intervals and the powering of the samples. Perhaps more pressing though is to what extent the control and intervention zones are comparable on various socio-economic, demographic, cultural and/or geographical factors? Based on the presented data, baseline equivalence is questionable.

Reported differences on behaviour outcomes could therefore be caused not by exposure, but by important underlying characteristics of the selected areas. The research methodology of RCTs should balance such differences, but when a relatively small number of areas are selected, this is unlikely to happen. Adjusting only for distance to a health centre, ie keeping its effect constant, is then insufficient to assess the actual impact of the intervention.

A Theory of Change could provide an important rationale for determining which characteristics to control for when analysing the data. So we look forward to seeing the endline results where adjustment for possible confounders is said to take place.

Statistical detail

From a research perspective, assessing the impact of an intervention becomes complicated when a succinct summary leaves out certain statistical information; sample sizes for outcomes which have been measured at the cluster level, and the accompanying standard errors are important for external researchers to be able to correctly interpret results.

A more technical report should provide that information to provide transparency about the study. It would also help us understand why strong relationships between the intervention and outcomes are reported, while p-values (probability values) in many cases are not significant. Could differences be the result of chance or is the study design making it difficult to detect significant change?

Interpretation and going forward

So far, the results seem to be mixed. For certain one-off behaviours, such as seeking treatment for diarrhoea at a clinic, there appears to be an impact, but for many others, and especially those like exclusive breastfeeding which are underpinned by social norms, the intervention does not appear to have had an effect. Though again, this is interpretation without technical information or qualitative data to inform us further.

The fact that these are midline results may also be a cause for the mixed results. It will take time to change people’s attitudes and perhaps three years is just too short. Endline results may be more conclusive. We would encourage future initiatives to evaluate interventions past their running time. After broadcasts have finished, do people fall back into old behaviours or has the change been sustainable? Is there any enduring impact we can bring about with mass communications?

A final note of caution is that it is important to realise this RCT is just one study, conducted under difficult, imperfect conditions. Even if we were able to conclusively interpret the current results, one swallow does not make a summer. We need to contextualise the results in the broader field of what we know media can and cannot do. Some smaller scale links that we at �鶹Լ�� Media Action are trying to establish are explored in a few of our recent research papers, a report examining the role of factual debate and discussion programming on political participation in Nepal and a paper which reviews field experiments in the media and political development sector.

This is an exciting moment for our sector. Our appetites have been whetted. We look forward to learning and understanding more from DMI and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine on the findings from the trial – and would love to be part of the conversation as the findings move from midline to endline over the next one and a half years.

It is a great opportunity for us all to learn about the impact of these findings of this unique trial which will affect us all.

For more information on the DMI Burkina Faso trial, contact Will Snell, Director of Development, Development Media International, +44 (0)20 3058 1631, will.snell@developmentmedia.net

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's research team

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Can we improve women's health without improving their status?

2014-05-21T10:20:04+00:00

“Men know more about everything. They also understand [things] better. We women are very emotional and thus do not take practical decisions. They are also the ones who earn money by working tirelessly and understand the value of money.”

These words were spoken by a woman we met while conducting research to inform our programmes in Odisha, India.

We were there to explore the reasons why many young women are not able to carry out the recommended health practices during pregnancy, such as attending enough antenatal appointments, or delivering their baby at a health facility.

As part of �鶹Լ�� Media Action's Global Grant programme, we were also able to conduct similar research across Bangladesh, Ethiopia, South Sudan and, as well as Odisha and Madhya Pradesh in India. (Read our full findings here.)

Alongside poor access to information and health services – young women's lack of status in society consistently emerged as a barrier to improving their health.

We found that young women’s health is not given priority when men are allocating money, and many young women do not have the confidence to negotiate for better care.

And where families are supportive of pregnant women receiving care, it’s often for benefit of the unborn child rather than for the woman.

Country insights

In Bangladesh and India many young rural women have little power and their mothers-in-law and husbands are the household decision-makers. Many mothers-in-law do not sanction a pregnant woman receiving special care.

Pregnant women fleeing fighting in South Sudan.

In South Sudan, meanwhile, following years of civil war, many young women are under pressure to give birth to as many children as possible within quick succession, as reflected by this health worker quoted in our research:

“The culture says let the woman produce. If you produce you will be a lucky woman at home, if you don’t produce the man will divorce.”

In Ethiopia our research found that young women appear to have relatively more autonomy and, generally, more supportive husbands, however it also found that some husbands refuse to help their pregnant wives with what they see as “women’s work”.

Impact on programmes

These findings suggest that women’s status and gender stereotypes shape what they do in relation to their health, across the four countries. But what does this mean for our programme makers?

We’ve shared these findings with our programme makers who are already trying to weave storylines and features around women’s status into our programmes to try to bring positive change.

For example, in Ethiopia, our maternal health radio programme has encouraged men to start calling their wives by their first names, which is a sign of greater respect.

In Bangladesh, our health TV drama, which is trying to delay the age of first marriage, portrays how taking a girl out of education to marry against her own will can act as the catalyst for the decline of her health and her family’s fortune.

It’ll be interesting to see to what extent these programmes will have an impact on attitudes towards women’s care – but from our initial findings, it seems clear that improving women’s health and status go hand in hand.

Related links

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's health work

Research report and briefing: Improving maternal health practices in four countries: insights and lessons learned

�鶹Լ�� Media Action’s work in Ethiopia , South Sudan , Bangladesh and India

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Improving accountability in Kenya

2014-04-25T14:06:04+00:00

The editorial team of our TV and radio debate show Sema Kenya – which returns for its third season this Sunday – have to be some of the luckiest programme makers in Kenya.

A large chunk of any producer’s time is spent looking for relevant, up-to-date information that they can use to engage audiences and enrich programme content. Happily for our Sema Kenya producers they have access to our secret weapon: R&L – aka �鶹Լ�� Media Action’s Research and Learning department – who do a lot of this heavy lifting for them.

In addition to support from the R&L team in London, we have three R&L staff in our Nairobi office – Dr Angela Muriithi, Sam Otieno and Norbert Aluku – who provide the editorial team with insightful gold-dust, making Sema Kenya arguably the most rigorously researched programme in Kenya today.

Over the last two years the team has conducted focus groups, rapid audience feedback sessions, national surveys and more. They’ve sifted through a blizzard of figures, mountains of qualitative data and performed weird and mysterious tasks such as ‘regression analysis’. (I’m told it’s not painful.)

And it’s all to make sure that Sema Kenya isn’t just a great programme that appeals to its audiences, but one that also achieves its development objectives: supporting accountability in Kenya by providing people with a platform for constructive, audience-driven debate.

Media and Kenya’s elections

The R&L team’s in-depth analysis is evident in a new piece of research by Dr Angela Muriithi and her colleague Georgina Page, which sets out to explore the role Sema Kenya played during the Kenyan 2013 general election.

As with all of the R&L team’s outputs, the paper aims to not only inform our production but also support others in our field. It’s available publicly online so others can use the data too and only last week, Angela also presented the research at a UNDP and EC conference in Jordan which brought together more than 200 electoral commissioners, judges and senior state officials from across the world to discuss and share knowledge about electoral support.

But to understand exactly why this research is important and relevant now, we have to go back to Kenya in December 2007.

The general election that Christmas was exciting. It was my first Kenyan election, and just as in the UK, I was glued to the media watching and listening to results and the endless analysis throughout the day of the vote.

What struck me was that unlike voters in many European countries, the majority of Kenyans still clearly sufficiently valued participation in the democratic process to stand for hours in the hot sun, queuing to cast their vote.

Watching lines of patient voters here is an awe-inspiring sight. It illustrates a faith in the democratic process that I only vaguely experienced as a UK voter at my local community hall.

Sadly for Kenya, the promise of that ballot was all too quickly extinguished.

Within hours of the voting booths closing and the winner of the presidential race being announced, a wave of violence was unleashed which saw over 1000 people murdered and half a million displaced.

Finger-pointing swiftly followed, with the media taking a large portion of the blame.

Everything from mis-reporting to hate-speech was said to have stoked the flames of the mayhem that followed the election.

It’s little wonder then that the 2013 election and the media’s role was so closely scrutinised.

‘Negotiating difference’

In the analysis of the media’s role during the 2007 election, a new term entered the vocabulary: ‘negative ethnicity’. In a country made up of more than 50 tribal groups one might expect this to be inevitable.

However this does not explain the previous decades of relatively peaceful co-existence.

What this briefing paper has shown however is that Sema Kenya is helping to encourage dialogue between disparate groups by highlighting commonalities rather than differences.

In a huge and geographically diverse country like Kenya, providing a platform to ‘negotiate difference’ as the researchers call it, can clearly provide some much needed social glue.

The paper doesn’t neglect to point out however that the media’s behaviour during the 2013 election was to some extent cowed.

So chastened was it by the accusations laid at its door after 2007’s awful events, it was said to have overcompensated in its desire to maintain peace. This could explain why the research showed Kenyans felt the media coverage during the election lacked depth.

Empowering effect

For me the most powerful role a programme like Sema Kenya can play in this context is to offer a mechanism for people to question those they elected.

The accountability agenda for Sema Kenya is its driving force and one the programme makers work hard to maintain.

This new research shows that the programme is helping to encourage Kenyans to expect more than just empty promises from their leaders. It is also empowering Kenyans themselves.

An audience member at one of the recordings explained why it is important programmes like Sema Kenya remain in the Kenyan media landscape: “There is someone like me and you… when you watch, it kind of inspires you to want to be like this other person. It makes you ask yourself, if this person is participating, why am I not participating? Because most of the time people don’t participate because they feel the political process is for the elites.”

Before, during and after elections, the need to stimulate debate, discussion and dialogue between Kenyans and their leaders remains as necessary as ever.

The third series of Sema Kenya (Kenya Speaks) starts on KBC1 and �鶹Լ�� Swahili on Sunday 27 April 2014.

Jackie Christie’s Sema Kenya blogs

Sema Kenya on Facebook

�鶹Լ�� Sema Kenya on �鶹Լ�� Swahili site

�鶹Լ�� Media Action’s work in Kenya

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A new Nigeria begins with me

2014-02-24T13:04:34+00:00

It was a typical Sunday morning. I was in the car driving to church and happily humming a tune to myself. But then, as I took a turn off the highway, I found the road ahead blocked – cordoned off for some high-level government official to pass.

Now road blocks and traffic jams are hardly rare in Abuja. For a church service, the road will be blocked. For Friday Jumat prayers, traffic comes to a standstill. And roads are often closed near police stations, banks, hotels and shopping malls.

As I sat behind my wheel, my reaction felt very familiar: a momentary surge of anger quickly replaced by helpless resignation. And it was only then that I suddenly recognised it was a reaction I had witnessed elsewhere - while conducting research on governance issues for �鶹Լ�� Media Action.

State of helplessness

Our research team was trying to find out why the Nigerian authorities appear to lack accountability and also why people don't question their leaders and administrations.

When we first started speaking to people about this issue in 2010, it seemed we were hitting the same wall over and over again. People kept on telling us things like, "I cannot talk [because] they will not listen." Law enforcement agencies, meanwhile, would tell us, "It’s beyond our jurisdiction". And community leaders would blame someone else for the lack of basic services.

We kept on witnessing what we've come to call the "blame game" or a "state of helplessness" at every level of society.

In late 2011, our research identified how detached people felt from the governance process and how unlikely it was for them to consider themselves agents of change. Most people claimed there was nothing they could do to address issues within the country other than to pray.

Abosede conducting a focus group.

The 'ordinary citizen'

But as I noticed my own feeling of helplessness in the traffic jam, I asked myself, don't we all have a role in making Nigeria better?

The answer to that question lies in the research we conducted in May 2012 during which citizens talked about participation in civic activities and governance processes as being the responsibility of everyone, including the 'ordinary citizen'.

While talking to people in one to one interviews and focus group discussions, we heard that citizens are afraid to challenge the government – perhaps an inevitable effect of decades of military rule.

Responsibilities

Thankfully, the situation is not entirely hopeless. Our radio programmes Talk Your Own – Make Naija Better (Make Nigeria Better) and Story Story focus on increasing citizens’ participation in the governance process.

And our research has identified subtle changes in how citizens perceive their responsibilities after they've listened to the programmes.

In a recent study one listener told us, "Since I have been listening to Talk Your Own I think that people should find a way that they can help Nigeria and make Nigeria once again a better place."

Through interviews, radio packages and on-air discussions, Talk Your Own explores ways people can participate in governance decisions on issues such as education, electricity, water supplies and roads – informing people, for example, how they can write public petitions or protest legally.

The show has also started to bring people and their leaders together for face-to-face conversations in Town Hall meetings, where citizens can publicly call the authorities to account and leaders can personally respond.

At the first town hall meeting, the topic of debate was youth unemployment, which currently stands at 54% in Nigeria. An invited audience of roughly 60 people asked four panellists tough questions about what they were doing to tackle it.

In this way, our team is tackling that familiar sense of helplessness and resignation that I felt that Sunday morning.

And I, for one, am determined to talk my own and make Naija better.

Related links

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's work in Nigeria

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's work on governance and rights

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A man's world?

2014-01-28T14:31:47+00:00

One of the most surprising figures to come out of last week's World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos wasn't to do with economics. It was, in fact, the number of female delegates taking part in the event itself: a paltry 15%.

Headlines have since asked ‘Where were the women in Davos?’. But is this microcosm of the political and economic elite representative of women's participation in politics more widely? Let's examine the evidence.

Mind the gap

The WEF's Gender Gap Report on 135 countries shows that women are consistently under-represented in parliaments around the world – although Cuba and Sweden come closest to parliamentary parity.

Perhaps surprisingly, the report also shows that developing countries can teach Western countries a thing or two about fairer representation. For example in Tanzania, 36% of parliamentary representatives are women. In Nepal, it’s 33%. In the UK? Only 23%.

Grassroots

But the Gender Gap Report only looks at women's participation in national politics. �鶹Լ�� Media Action's survey data from the countries in which we work gives a unique insight into how ordinary women participate in politics at a local level.

In Tanzania, for example, female representation in parliament appears to be underpinned by women’s active engagement in grassroots politics.

Women participated consistently more than men: they are more likely to take part in an effort to solve a problem in their communities, more likely to attend a local council meeting and more likely to contact officials and traditional leaders.

But in other countries where we have similar data, the outlook is a little less positive.

In Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Burma and the Palestinian Territories, women tend to participate less than men. But even with this disparity, in certain countries the figures are encouraging.

In Sierra Leone, where promoting women's participation in politics has been at the top of the agenda as part of the post-conflict reconciliation process, our research found 60% of women had taken part in an effort to solve a problem in their communities, compared to 68% of men.

However, in Bangladesh and Nepal, despite relatively high levels of female representation in parliament (20% and 33% respectively), women's grassroots participation is quite low.

In Nepal, 24% of women have contacted an official or traditional leader, as opposed to 61% of men. And in Bangladesh only 6% of women have taken part in efforts to solve a problem in their communities, versus 33% of men.

Giving a voice

Countless barriers, from economic deprivation to violence against women and domestic duties, mean that it is often more difficult for women to participate in politics than men. But in spite of these challenges, our data shows that women are playing an active role in their communities.

A recording of �鶹Լ�� Media Action's radio debate show, Tok Bot Salone (Talk About Sierra Leone).

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's governance TV and radio programmes seek to ensure these women’s voices are more audible, give them a platform to question their leaders and equip them with the confidence to participate in politics and in their communities. We do this by covering issues which address the needs of women and girls and by always ensuring women are fairly represented on the shows’ panels and audiences.

So while the Davos delegate list shows there’s still some way to go for parity on the global political stage, look deeper and the picture is both more complex and more encouraging.

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's work on governance and rights

�鶹Լ�� Media Action's Research and Learning team

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Is anybody out there?

2013-12-24T11:28:40+00:00

Anniversary concert to mark the 57th anniversary of Algerian national radio

Earlier this month the people of Algeria celebrated the 57th anniversary of the creation of their national radio – originally launched in secret to counteract the propaganda of the colonial administration.The anniversary was marked by a concert in the capital city, Algiers.

The event was headlined by Imzad an Algerian group whose music is based on the traditional Algerian instrument of the same name. A wide range of people attended; from teenagers to grandmothers and from taxi drivers to company directors. Yet by the end of the night everyone was dancing together in the aisles. The concert was also broadcast live on three of Algeria’s national radio stations.

The next day, I led a training session at the national radio. I talked to the delegates about the diversity of the audience at the concert and their enthusiasm for the music of Algeria. But when I asked if the audience listening to the concert on the radio was equally enthusiastic no one knew the answer.

I was not surprised; radio and television broadcasting are peculiar forms of communication. Most of the communication is one-directional. Radio is not like a concert where the performers can see if the audience is dancing in the aisles. The broadcaster can only assume their programmes are being watched or listened to. However to find out if their assumption is true they need audience research.

Aiding the creative process

Knowing more about their audiences can give producers essential information to aid the creative process of programme making. It can also help make more efficient use of limited resources. At present, there is little or no audience research conducted in Algeria. There is however a clear desire for this information. The trainees from the national radio wanted to know who is listening to their programmes, what their audiences like and what they would like more of. In particular, whether their youth radio station Jil FM, is providing the type of programmes young Algerians need and want.

I shared my experience of conducting audience research for Media Action across the Middle East and North Africa region. We discussed how research can be conducted in Algeria and came up with a plan for this small group of broadcasters to conduct focus group research across Algeria over the next three months.Hopefully, one of the things we will find out is whether the radio audience is as diverse and as enthusiastic about the music of Algeria as the people dancing in the aisles to Imzad.

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The challenges of conducting research in Burma

2013-11-22T10:54:00+00:00

"Where in the past we were bound tightly by ten ropes, nowadays I feel like the number of ropes has been reduced by two.” These were the words of an elderly man who earlier this year took part in a �鶹Լ�� Media Action focus group in Burma (also known as Myanmar).

He was speaking from Yangon where there have been palpable changes in freedom of expression and access to information in recent times. Public demonstrations are now permitted more often, low-cost SIM cards are improving people’s access to information on mobiles and 11 new daily newspapers have launched - some carrying strong opposition views.

But for the majority of Burma’s population – who live in rural areas, did not finish secondary education and have more limited access to media – day-to-day life has not changed in any radical way.

Research challenge

As a researcher working to inform media projects to support improved governance in Burma, understanding the extent to which the public feels they are informed and able to speak, question and take action is crucial.

But the irony in conducting research of this kind is that the restrictions people perceive to remain around freedom of expression and association influence how they react when posed with questions on these themes.

Our research and learning team realised the extent of this challenge in Burma, while conducting our research earlier this year.

From May to July, we took a multi-methods approach to a study that sought to understand the issues of concern to the public; their expectations of leaders; perceptions of accountability and opportunities and barriers to engage in dialogue and take action on issues of local importance.

The study employed both quantitative and qualitative methods, conducting a nationally representative household survey of 1224 people, as well as focus group discussions and key informant interviews in communities across five of Burma’s 14 states and regions. The Yangon resident quoted above was one of more than 220 people who actively participated in such discussions.

Conflicting findings

While participants in focus groups engaged in lively discussions about the shortcomings of health, education and water and sanitation services in their communities, 32% of the survey participants said that they ‘did not know’ about any matter of concern to people in their local area.

Focus groups revealed that in some rural areas people were confused about whether the government or an INGO should be responsible for public service provision, and that most villages had no interaction with their local authorities beyond requests sent down through village administrators to “raise funds”. In contrast, 70% of rural survey participants told us that their local government did indeed respond to the needs of citizens.

So what do these conflicting sources of data tell us about the realities of a Burma in transition - and how best to research the public’s experience?

The cautious answer: ‘I don’t know’

The first takeaway is a sense check on where and when large-scale survey research can have value in Burma right now.

Do 32% of people in Burma really not have an opinion on what’s causing concern for people in their own communities? We are not convinced and feedback from the field provides several reasons why responses like this are more likely to be avoidance than lack of awareness.

Field interviewers describe participants’ cautious reactions to the survey experience, and to particular questions. Some participants showed caution in expressing an opinion on social or political themes, some caution in expressing an opinion to a stranger, and others caution in expressing an opinion at all.

In a country where people have been actively discouraged from expressing opinions for decades, ‘I don’t know’ is a very easy way to avoid making statements that might draw unwanted attention - despite assurances that the process is confidential and anonymous.

Willingness to respond

Tracking shifts in people’s willingness and ability to respond to questions like these in the future will reveal a lot about the public sense of confidence and capacity to play a role in the political landscape.

Freedom metrics included in the survey provide an internal benchmark too. Ask the public how free they think they are to say what they think and 68% will tell you that they are ‘somewhat’ or ‘very free’.

But qualify that statement to freedom to express ‘views about the government in public’, and the figure drops to 43%, with 25% saying they do not know. The caution exercised for some but not other survey questions suddenly makes more sense.

As a means to understand media consumption and the most effective ways to reach marginalised groups however, the survey is a useful tool. Ask people how often they watch television and response rates jump back to 99%.

Multi-method is the way to go

The data demonstrates also the value of a multi-method approach. Where the quantitative survey required data collectors to ask questions in households where they were strangers, our qualitative study took a more participatory approach.

Through a continuing partnership with ActionAid Myanmar, we trained young community mobilisers to facilitate in-depth discussions in villages where they are known and trusted by the inhabitants.

Facilitators were able to create a safe space where respondents were at their ease, probe gradually to draw out explanations beyond surface respondents, and break down unfamiliar concepts - such as who is ‘accountable’ for community development - into hyper-local terms.

The resulting data provides rich insights into people’s engagement with and expectations of governance processes, and aids interpretation of the big numbers coming from the survey.

For example, where a survey statistic alone would suggest that people are quite satisfied with their local government’s level of responsiveness (69%), the focus groups revealed that people had very low expectations of local government to provide anything in the first place. When expectations are low, criticism will be too.

We do need to recognise that young mobilisers may already have influenced political awareness and attitudes in communities like these, and so may set those people apart from the wider population in some way. However the insights that can be gained from people confident enough to exercise voice in a research setting are invaluable in a country where so little data on the individual experience of governance exists.

Value of participatory approaches

Our elderly Yangon resident went on to say: "We have started to have the right to speak freely. In the past, we didn't tell each other as we didn't trust each other. We just suffered alone. But now we have started to discuss bravely whether what we feel or think is right or wrong."

If his view rings true for how people in Burma will adapt to their changing political context, it may be that large-scale surveys will become powerful tools to inform governance work in the future.

In the meantime, however, researchers should be looking to partner with communities themselves to draw on the strengths that qualitative, in-depth, personal approaches can offer.

Related links

Research Summary: Exploring Burma's media

�鶹Լ�� Media Action’s work in Burma

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Putting communities at the heart of climate change communications

2013-10-23T13:55:13+00:00

Listening to people's everyday experiences is at the heart of the Climate Asia research project, the largest ever study into how people in seven Asian countries live and deal with climate change. So it was no surprise to me that last month I found myself in a remote Indian village doing – yes, you've guessed it – more listening.

Iwas in the tiny village of Balikuda on the coast of Odisha to continue the training of non-governmental organisations which we've rolled out in India after launching our findings last month. I had travelled to the village with a local NGO calledRegional Centre for Development Cooperation (RCDC) and we were there to carry out what we called a 'co-creation session'.

This meant that instead of focusing purely on improving the skills of the NGO's communicators, we concentrated on gathering insights from the audience and how these can be used to shape more effective climate change communication projects to support them.

Communication cards

To do this, we had come armed with a deck of cards to get people talking. Part of the Climate Asia toolkit which can be downloaded here, they come in five categories: themes, objectives, audiences, partners, formats and channels.

So, for example, if an NGO wanted to find out the priority issues facing a community, they would hand over the cards – with options ranging from 'education' to 'livelihoods' – and ask them to pick the top three or arrange them in order of importance.

The insights gained from the various combinations of the cards can help us understand the aspirations and needs of communities with whom we work and avoid the top-down approach that all too often marks climate change communications. The approach also works to also break down the concept of 'climate change' into simpler elements, such as rain, forests, agriculture, flood, drought etc.

Responding to past natural disasters

In Balikuda, the mostly female group we spoke to were initially reticent to give their opinions.

But when given the cards, they told us they felt more 'in charge'of the conversation and started to give very animated and nuanced answers.

The villagers of Balikuda know all too well the cost of natural disasters. Located only 5k from the coast, Balikuda was devastated by the Odisha Super cyclone of 1999 which decimated land and livelihoods and left over 15,000 dead.

Thanks to the painstaking efforts of the village community and RCDC, the village had successfully rebuilt itself on a more resilient basis. They had diversified their livelihoods so they wouldn't be so reliant on one source of income; created disaster reduction and response teams; planned evacuation strategies and increased their general awareness of disasters and what it means to be more resilient.

Using the cards, the group quickly identified the top five areas where they needed information so they could improve their lives; water, health, forests, disasters and methods to improve existing livelihoods and agriculture.

Their choices reflected the findings of our Climate Asia research in the state which found that 23% of those surveyed in Odisha worry about not having enough drinking water and 29% fear not having enough food. (For more detail on our findings in Odisha and in the other seven countries in which we conducted over 33,000 interviews, visit our data portal.)

Preferred channels

The group then matched each of the five priorities with the formats and channels they preferred, coming up with some great ideas.

Some women suggested that information about health could best be delivered through storylines in their favourite soap opera.

Other members of the group, meanwhile, said a toll-free phone service from the Department of Agriculture would be a perfect way of getting hold of information about best farming practices and weather information about when to sow or reap for example.

And they had some very strong opinions about what worked best. In terms of better agricultural practices, the women commented vociferously that they preferred watching films or documentaries featuring examples from other villages and told us that this is because they only trust fellow farmers.

When it came to disasters, they chose a mixture of what is called 'on-ground activations' (street theatre, community discussion, community screenings and posters/pamphlets) before disasters strike and then mass media (including information on mobile) for dealing with the aftermath.

Most trusted sources

The women also identified certain institutions as being most trustworthy: mass media (TV and Radio) and local NGOs were perceived to be the most trusted sources. They also had faith in their local governments when it came to information on a few specific issues such as disasters and health.

One woman commented: "Official institutions play a greater role in the domain of health. We cannot trust any pamphlet handed out by any and every one. Similarly in the face of a disaster we cannot evacuate unless a trusted media source of governmental source tells us to."

Indeed, as a result of this observation, the group came up with their own solution to how information about emergencies should be communicated to them. "The state government should set up a service which calls the gram panchayat (village level government) or maybe even all of us on our mobile phones so that we know to respond in time," they said.

Emergency response

The sad irony was that only 12 days after we were discussing disaster response in Balikuda, Cyclone Phailin – the strongest tropical storm to hit India in more than a decade – slammed into Odisha.

Thankfully, the death toll remained low thanks to an evacuation effort that saw 900,0000 Odisha residents moved into emergency shelters. But the massive storm has caused widespread flooding, destroyed crops and made more than a half a million people homeless.

In Balikuda, the lessons learned from the cyclone in 1999 combined with NGO support helped the villagers respond. Suresh Bisoyi, the director of field operations for RCDC, told me, "The village disaster reduction task force worked well and the mock-drills and training were used. Although we were a little low on resources and some people refused to evacuate their homes, people came together to deal with Phailin."

Now the hard work to rebuild homes and livelihoods is beginning in Balikuda. And if our session helps that hard work to be more effective and responsive to the villagers' needs, it'll be worth it.

Related links

Climate Asia data portal

Resources on the Climate Asia data portal

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