"In this fully revised and expanded Fourth Edition, Ronald E. Rice and Charles K. Atkin provide readers with a comprehensive, up-to-date look into the field of public communication campaigns. Updated to reflect the latest theories and research, this text extends coverage to new areas, including sun
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protection, organ donation, human rights, social norms, corporate social responsibility, condom use, ocean sustainability, fear messages, and digital games. Classic chapters include updates on topics such as campaign history, theoretical foundations, formative evaluation, systems approaches, input-output persuasion matrix, design and evaluation, meta-analysis, and sense-making methodology." (Publisher description)
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"To encourage smoking cessation, persuasive messages can be used to raise smokers' risk perception. This article discusses challenges and solutions in designing a study to evaluate the effect of two different communication strategies ("gains from quitting" vs. "losses from continuing smoking") in en
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couraging calls to a quitline. The authors conducted an intervention study in two subway stations for 4 weeks, considering only 1 strategy per station. Large posters containing non-age-specific images and texts, on the basis of the theme "shortness of breath," were displayed on central dividing columns on the boarding platforms. Call rates from the selected stations, and respective rate ratios, overall and per study week, were calculated. Passengers who were smokers, exposed to the positive-content message, called on average 1.7 times more often than did those exposed to the negative-content message (p = .01). Moreover, call rate ratios did not decline over the 4 weeks of the study (p = .40). The effectiveness findings suggest that antismoking campaigns could use positive-content messages in order to recruit a larger smoker population. The proposed methodology can also be used to evaluate effectiveness of messages for "capturing" individuals with other health problems (e.g., alcohol abuse), thereby increasing its potential impact." (Abstract)
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"Behavior Change Communication (BCC) interventions have become an integral part of many HIV prevention programs. Monitoring and evaluation is expected to be included in the design of any BCC interventions from the beginning on. However, the know-how on how to demonstrate results and impacts of such
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interventions in a methodologically sound way often lags behind. This document aims at enhancing program officials' understanding of the importance of evaluations as well as the most important steps to take and decisions to make in the course of an evaluation, and at enabling them to oversee the work done by the evaluators.
It is divided into three parts. The first part presents the main general aspects that need to be taken into consideration when monitoring and evaluating BCC interventions with a focus on HIV-related BCC approaches. More specifically, a general framework for monitoring and evaluation is presented, including among others information on the use of appropriate indicators, the development of an evaluation plan, different types of evaluation, study designs of summative evaluations, statistical analysis and dissemination of the evaluation results. Based on this theoretical background presented in part one, the second part draws conclusions, presents recommendations and gives practical advice on monitoring and evaluating HIV BCC programs. Three types of HIV BCC interventions, relevant to the work of German Development Cooperation (GDC), are also here discussed; these are the tool Join-in-Circuit, peer education programs and mass media campaigns. The third part presents four country examples of M&E of HIV BCC interventions implemented by GDC programs. These were discussed during a short-course on evaluation of BBC interventions offered by GIZ from 9]10 March, 2012 in Johannesburg, South Africa." (Executive summary)
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"This document outlines basic steps in planning monitoring and evaluation for advocacy and covers: distinctive features of monitoring and evaluation for advocacy; five questions for planning advocacy monitoring and evaluation; special focuses on equity, humanitarian advocacy monitoring and evaluatio
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n, and knowledge management; aeventeen data collection tools for measuring advocacy outputs, outcomes and impacts; dour case studies from Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania, Mexico, Tajikistan and Iceland; following up with next steps. This is the full version of Chapter 4 in UNICEF’s Advocacy Toolkit." (Page 1)
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"This paper introduces the scope of, and rational for, engaging in advocacy work as part of development interventions. It then focuses on the issue of monitoring and evaluating these efforts – offering reasons why and when these processes should be planned and implemented, what’s involved, and w
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ho should be engaged in the process. It concludes by looking at some of the particular challenges and opportunities that the monitoring and evaluation of advocacy work presents. It also offers some helpful considerations to those who are designing or implementing these processes. The paper relies heavily on previous publications produced by INTRAC, based on work in advocacy with organisations such as DFID, Plan, Transparency International, PSI and also on a Save the Children publication, Advocacy Matters." (Introduction, page 1)
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"Although the argument for evaluating advocacy is convincing, advocacy has long been considered “too hard to measure,” and so far relatively few advocates, funders, or evaluators have taken on the challenge. But this is now changing. Interest in advocacy evaluation is surging and cutting-edge ad
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vocates are embracing evaluation as a critical part of their work. The main barrier preventing more organizations from using evaluation is a lack of familiarity with how to think about and design evaluations of advocacy efforts that are useful, manageable, and resource-efficient. Even knowing where to start can be a challenge. This tool was developed to help address that gap in knowledge. It guides users through four basic steps of advocacy evaluation planning." (Page 3)
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"[...] Fortunately, in the last decade in particular, much progress has been made on incorporating social science theory into both campaign design and evaluation, primarily in the health field. Indeed, evaluators are being encouraged to engage in theory testing and/or logic model development. Findin
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gs from recent meta-analyses suggest that newer communication campaigns are increasingly utilizing theory. In addition, there has been great diversity in the theories being applied in this area, and many of the theories being used most often, including the Theory of Reasoned Action, Social Cognitive Theory, and the transtheoretical “Stages of Change” model, also are widely studied in the health behavior change literature.
An evaluation research team typically consists of program staff in charge of program planning and a program evaluator. Often, the program evaluator is one of the few behavioral or social scientists on the project. Without a theorist on the team, the theory behind the project is likely to remain implicit from the start. The failure to acknowledge or discuss theory from the beginning risks wasting resources on message strategies that are not adequately linked to psychosocial predictors of behavior, and on performance measures that are off the mark. Thus, all program personnel should be involved in theory/logic model development so that the theoretical underpinnings of the project are grounded in more than evaluator assumptions." (Introduction)
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"This brief offers an overview of current practice in the new and now rapidly growing field of advocacy evaluation. It highlights the kinds of approaches being used, offers specific examples of how they are being used and who is using them, and identifies the advantages and disadvantages of each app
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roach. The brief is organized around the summary matrix on page 2, which identifies four key evaluation design questions and then offers common advocacy evaluation responses to those questions.1 Questions include: 1) Who will do the evaluation? 2) What will the evaluation measure? 3) When will the evaluation take place? 4) What methodology will the evaluation use? For each question, three options or possible responses are given. Options are based on the experiences of advocates, evaluators, and funders who already have responded to these questions and are learning about the benefits and drawbacks of their choices." (Page 1)
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"Advocacy and policy change evaluations focus on policy as the unit of analysis rather than the more traditional program or project. There is growing interest in this form of evaluation as evidenced by a new American Evaluation Association Topical Interest Group with this focus. Julia Coffman (2007)
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began her important article “What’s Different About Evaluating Advocacy and Policy Change?” by noting what’s not different. I want to reaffirm her perspective. Advocacy evaluation, like all evaluation, is guided by the profession’s Principles and Standards. Advocacy evaluation can be, and I believe should be, utilization-focused. That means focusing the evaluation on intended use by intended users, and evaluating the evaluation by that standard." (Page 1)
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"In this paper we will be looking at the evidence of impact from interventions in the so-called ‘traditional’ media – TV, radio and, to a much lesser extent, print – and factors contributing to that impact. By ‘media interventions’ we mean using mass-media in support of development objec
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tives and as part of development projects to help bring about behaviour change – for instance, the use of TV/radio spots (also known as PSAs – public service announcements) to promote condom use, or radio programmes to promote better agricultural practices. This should not be confused with so-called ‘media development’, which aims to create independent and professional media, recognising the potential of the media as an important independent agent of social and political change, for example in governance." (Introduction)
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"The overall purpose of this guide is twofold. To help grantmakers think about and talk about measurement of advocacy and policy, this guide puts forth a framework for naming outcomes associated with advocacy and policy work as well as directions for evaluation design. The framework is intended to p
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rovide a common way to identify and talk about outcomes, providing philanthropic and non-profit audiences an opportunity to react to, refine and adopt the outcome categories presented. In addition, grantmakers can consider some key directions for evaluation design that include a broad range of methodologies, intensities, audiences, timeframes and purposes." (Introduction, page 1)
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"This handbook draws on multidisciplinary insights and the experiences of academics and campaign practitioners to provide a comprehensive guide and introduction to planning, implementing and measuring public information and communication campaigns. It outlines the basic theoretical approaches and pr
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ovides practical examples from a variety of both national and international information and communication campaigns within and across Europe. Public opinion information and campaign strategies in a recent American state election campaign are used to contrast the different perspectives and experiences in the United States. The handbook concludes by demonstrating how to measure effects, causality and public opinion change to determine what the campaign accomplished. A helpful summary and checklist for the student and practitioner using survey research is provided at the end." (Publisher description)
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"This Scoping Study marks the beginning of a large body of work that will be carried out by ActionAid to explore and develop ways in which we can best monitor and evaluate different aspects of this work. This Scoping Study is literally the first step. It sets out to document the various frameworks a
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nd approaches that international agencies are using to assess the value of their advocacy work. The report draws on a large body of literature as well as, where possible, on first hand interviews and discussions. The report does not attempt to evaluate the various frameworks. It sets out to draw together a body of knowledge without passing judgement on the merits or demerits of various approaches." (Preface)
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