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Entertainment-Education Campaigns and COVID-19: How Three Global Organizations Adapted the Health Communication Strategy for Pandemic Response and Takeaways for the Future

Amy Henderson Riley, Angeline Sangalang, Elizabeth Critchlow, Neemesha Brown, Radharani Mitra, Brenda Campos Nesme

Health Communication, volume 36, issue 1 (2021), pp. 42-49

"COVID-19 created a substantial set of challenges for health communication practitioners in the process of planning, implementing, and evaluating entertainment-education (EE) campaigns. EE is a theory and evidence-based communication strategy that employs entertainment media for educational messagin ... more

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In Full View: Creatively Tackling Sanitation in India

London: BBC Media Action (2020), 14 pp.

"Navrangi Re! (Nine To A Shade), a 26–episode television drama series was created to take the discussion on e Faecal Sludge Management (FSM) to mainstream audiences, beyond the domain of infrastructure and technology. It was the result of a unique partnership between a donor (the Bill & Melinda Ga ... tes Foundation), a commercial media network (Viacom18), an academic institution (Centre for Social & Behavior Change, Ashoka University), an evaluation partner (Oxford Policy Management), and a global media brand with proven social and behaviour change communication expertise (BBC Media Action). Navrangi Re! is the story of an urban neighbourhood – a mohalla – where lots of different people live cheek by jowl, and through the trials and tribulations of life in an urban jungle, find ways to overcome this constant crisis mode that has become normalised. The mohalla is a creative device to accommodate an entire socio–economic microcosm, with different families occupying different points on the sanitation value chain [...] The evaluation results of Navrangi Re! demonstrate the power of narratives in making the invisible, visible – in bringing attention to critical, silent and complex social problems. They also validate the science, art and craft used in BBC Media Action’s narrative ‘engagement’ model – a) rooting the storytelling in research and theory, b) a commitment to an immersive creative approach and c) an unwavering focus on ‘entertainment first’. The results also show that it is possible for narratives to walk the tightrope between outcomes and audience ratings to achieve change. There is strong evidence that an insight–based Theory of Change combined with all the ingredients that make compelling drama helped Navrangi Re! deliver on the twin challenges of achieving Television Rating Points (TRPs) week after week and demonstrating impact. The results shine the light on the need for innovative partnerships. Crafting partnerships that bring together donors, private sector platforms, academia, research and storytellers is the need of the hour. In a post–Covid world, different stakeholders need to convene more of these partnerships to leverage the power of narrative for stronger societies." (Pages 2-14) more

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Influencing the Means But Not the Ends: The Role of Entertainment-Education Interventions in Development

Christopher Grady, Alice Iannantuoni, Matthew S. Winters

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Political Science (2019), 40 pp.

"As new information technologies facilitate the production and dissemination of broadcast media, entertainment-education interventions are increasingly used in attempts to influence audiences on issues such as political participation, support for democracy, violence against women, and tolerance of e ... more

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The Effectiveness of Using Entertainment Education Narratives to Promote Safer Sexual Behaviors of Youth: A Meta-Analysis, 1985-2017

Victor Orozco-Olvera, Fuyuan Shen, Lucie Cluver

Plos One, volume 14, issue 2: e0209969 (2019), 14 pp.

"Risky sexual behaviors are associated with the transmission of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and unwanted pregnancies, both major health concerns for youth worldwide. This review studies the effectiveness of narrated mass media programs in promoting safer sexual practices among youth in de ... more

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The Entertaining Way to Behavioral Change: Fighting HIV with MTV

Abhijit Banerjee, Eliana La Ferrara, Victor Orozco-Olvera

Washington, DC: World Bank Group (2019), 45 pp.

"This paper tests the effectiveness of an entertainment education television series, MTV Shuga, aimed at providing information and changing attitudes and behaviors related to HIV/AIDS. Using a simple model, the paper shows that “edutainment” can work through an individual or a social channel. Th ... more

Entertainment-Education and Health and Risk Messaging
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Suruchi Sood, Amy Henderson Riley, Kristine Cecile Alarcon

Oxford University Press (2017)

"Entertainment-education (EE) began as a communication approach that uses both entertainment and education to engender individual and social change, but is emerging as a distinct theoretical, practice, and evidence-based communication subdiscipline. EE has roots in oral and performing arts tradition ... s spanning thousands of years, such as morality tales, religious storytelling, and the spoken word. Modern-day EE, meanwhile, is produced in both fiction and nonfiction designs that include many formats: local street theater, music, puppetry, games, radio, television, and social media. A classic successful example of EE is the children’s television program Sesame Street, which is broadcast in over 120 countries. EE, however, is a strategy that has been successfully planned, implemented, and evaluated in countries around the world for children and adults alike. EE scholarship has traditionally focused on asking, “Does it work?” but more recent theorizing and research is moving toward understanding how EE works, drawing from multidisciplinary theories. From a research standpoint, such scholarship has increasingly showcased a wide range of methodologies. The result of these transformations is that EE is becoming an area of study, or subdiscipline, backed by an entire body of theory, practice, and evidence. The theoretical underpinnings, practice components, and evidence base from EE may be surveyed via the peer- reviewed literature published over the past 10 years. However, extensive work in social change from EE projects around the world has not all made it into the published literature. EE historically began as a communication approach, one tool in the communication toolbox. Over time, the nascent approach became its own full-fledged strategy focused on individual change. Backed by emerging technologies, innovative examples from around the globe, and new variations in implementation, it becomes clear that the field of EE is emerging into a discrete theoretical, practice, and evidence-based subdiscipline within communication that increasingly recognizes the inherent role of individuals, families, communities, organizations, and policies on improving the conditions needed for lasting social change." (Summary) more

Can Mass Media Cause Change? A Randomised Control Trial Finds Out

BBC Media Action (2016)

"Can the mass media cause changes in an audience’s knowledge, attitudes and intention to practise behaviours? At BBC Media Action, we have just successfully conducted a randomised control trial (RCT) to investigate this chain of causality in a prime time health TV drama in Bangladesh." (Introducti ... more

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Evidence Supporting a Promotora-Delivered Entertainment Education Intervention for Improving Mothers' Dietary Intake: The 'Entre Familia: Reflejos De Salud' Study

Guadalupe X. Ayala et al.

Journal of Health Communication, volume 20, issue 2 (2015), pp. 165-176

"Entertainment education and the promotora model are 2 evidence-based health communication strategies. This study examined their combined effect on promoting healthy eating among mothers in a family-based intervention. Participants were 361 Mexican-origin families living in Imperial County, Californ ... more

Entertainment-Education for Health Behaviour Change: Issues and Perspectives in Africa

Chima E. Onuekwe (ed.)

Victoria, BC: Friesen Press (2015), xix, 271 pp.

"Entertainment-education for Health Behaviour Change: Issues and Perspectives in Africa is a collection of essays from some of the leading scholars in entertainment-education, including writers from South Africa, Nigeria, and the United States. Chapters cover a wide range of application and strategi ... more

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Entertainment Education Saves Lives and Improves Health: Key Steps to Developing Effective Programs

Caroline Jacoby, Jane Brown, Uttara Bharath Kumar, Rajiv N. Rimal, Sanjanthi Velu

In: Health Communication: Strategies for Developing Global Health Programs

Do Kyun Kim; Arvind Singhal; Gary L. Kreps (eds.)

New York et al.: Peter Lang (2014), pp. 83-100

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Entertainment-Education für Kinder: Potenziale medialer Gesundheitsförderung im Bereich Ernährung

Kathleen Arendt

Baden-Baden: Nomos (2013), 336 pp.

"Vor dem Hintergrund der aktuellen Debatte um die Rolle der Medien für das kindliche Ernährungsverhalten und Übergewicht stellt dieser Band die Entertainment-Education-Strategie als Weg für eine effektive mediale Gesundheitskommunikation in den Mittelpunkt. Untersucht wird, ob in unterhaltende F ... more

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Health Communication: Strategies for Developing Global Health Programs

Do Kyun Kim, Arvind Singhal, Gary L. Kreps (eds.)

New York: Peter Lang (2013), vii, 383 pp.

"Promotion of healthy behaviors and prevention of disease are inextricably linked to cultural understandings of health and well-being. Health communication scholarship and practice can substantially and strategically contribute to people living safer, healthier, and happier lives. This book represen ... more

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The Impacts of an Entertainment-Education Radio Serial Drama in Botswana on Outcomes Related to HIV Prevention Goals in the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief

L. Meghan Mahoney, Benjamin R. Bates

Journal of African Media Studies, volume 5, issue 3 (2013), pp. 353-367

"This study examines the effectiveness of an entertainment education (EE) programme, Makgabaneng, in reducing the spread of HIV/AIDS in Botswana. If successful, this communication intervention should result in greater self-report of attitudes, actions and knowledge related to risk reduction goals am ... more

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Entertainment Education and Social Change

Critical Arts: South-North Cultural and Media Studies, volume 27, issue 1 (2013), 146 pp.

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Effects of the Gama Cuulu Radio Serial Drama on HIV-Related Behavior Change in Zambia

Joan Marie Kraft et al.

Journal of Health Communication, volume 17, issue 8 (2012), pp. 929-945

"The Gama Cuulu radio serial drama is written and produced in Zambia's Southern Province. It promotes behavior change and service use to prevent HIV transmission. The authors evaluated the effects of Gama Cuulu on intermediate outcomes (e.g., perceived norms), as well as number of sexual partners, c ... more

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