Behaviour change communication

Behaviour change communication

Purpose and Goals of BCC
• BCC is a process for developing messages and approaches using a mix of communication channels in order to encourage and sustain positive and appropriate behaviours.
• Purpose of behavior change
o Help people gain the awareness, knowledge and ability to meet their developmental needs.

o Forms an essential part of a comprehensive HIV prevention, care and support programmes.

• The goal of BCC is to
o Promote behavioural change at the individual, community and policy level and create an environment that fosters the maintenance of that changed behaviour.
o Increase knowledge on basic facts about health and allows people to change behaviour towards health living.
o Stimulate community dialogue on factors that fuel the HIV epidemic.
o Promote advocacy in cases of need to change policies.
o Reduce stigma and discrimination through provision of accurate information e.g. HIV and AIDS.
o Promote services for prevention care and support e.g. HIV and AIDS.
o BCC is oriented to helping people understand issues and to act in ways that improve their health, education or economic well being.

Factors Affecting Behaviour Change
• Knowledge is understanding of facts or reality about something
o Before individuals and communities can reduce their level of risk or change their
behaviours, they must first understand the basic facts about their health problem, assess and modify their attitudes, learn new skills, and gain access to appropriate products and services
• Belief is an association of a certain outcome to an object
• Attitude is personal judgement of favourableness or unfavourableness
o To change behaviour people must perceive their environment as supportive of behaviour change and the maintenance of safe behaviours

🔹Value is personal judgement about quality or importance of something
o For example services, commodities (e.g. condoms, drugs), and policies that promote non-discrimination and trust
• Social pressure is an influence of significant others (friends, parents, siblings etc) to an individual to act in a way they like
• Factors influencing behaviour change can be further categorized into internal and external factors:

o Internal factors come from within a person for example knowledge, beliefs, attitude, and values.
o External factors come from person’s environment for example social pressure
o Both internal and external factors have to be addressed to bring about behaviour change

Conducting BCC Session
• Before conducting BCC do the following

o Assess current behaviours related to the area(s) of concern
o Identify the barriers and enabling factors for improvements
o Discover motivations or enabling factors
o Identify feasible behaviours for change
o Involve individuals, families, communities, institutions and policymakers in developing and implementing effective BCC strategies

Steps in Conducting BCC
•      Step 1: Advocacy and stakeholder involvement
•      Step 2: Identification and segmentation of target populations
•      Step 3: Formative assessment for BCC
•      Step 4: Development of a BCC strategy
•      Step 5: Development of communication support materials
•      Step 6: Implementation of the BCC programme
•      Step 7: Monitoring and evaluation
•      Step 8: Feedback and revision

Steps to Follow up After Conducting BCC

• Monitoring
o Measuring progress in achieving BCC objectives and determining whether the
programme is on track require monitoring of activities and reactions.
o Once you have developed the BCC strategy and designed interventions, you will be ready to establish a monitoring plan.
o Monitoring must take place continually throughout the life of the programme.

• Evaluation
o Helps determine the effectiveness, relevance, reach and impact on BCC activities. It indicates whether the project is achieving its objectives, and it should be an integral part of the entire programme, not just a report at the end.
o It takes place at the beginning, When you
     Conduct a formative assessment
     Develop BCC objectives
     Carry out pre-testing
     Implement the programme in line with the envisioned process and output
o Evaluation should answer the following questions
    √  What outcomes are observed?
    √  What do the outcomes mean?
      √ Does the programme make a difference?
        Questions asked should be based on, and refer to, behaviour change communication
objectives and the behaviour change goals of the general programme
   For example, evaluation will help determine if a BCC objective, such as stimulating
community dialogue on risk and stigma, was actually achieved. Evaluation will show
if there is more open discussion on issues of risk and stigma in the community.

BCC in HIV Programmes

Goals of BCC in HIV and AIDS Programmes
• Increase knowledge and understanding about HIV and AIDS in Tanzania
• Increase knowledge about basic facts of HIV and AIDS to allow people to change behavior positively
• Stimulate family and community dialogue on factors that contribute to the problems of the HIV epidemic
• Promote advocacy in order to change policy
• Reduce stigma and discrimination through provision of accurate information
• Promote services for prevention care and support
• Create demand for health-related information and services
• Build confidence that individuals and communities can change their situation
Enabling BCC in HIV
• Before individuals can change their behaviour and reduce their level of risk, they must understand the basic facts about HIV.
• They must also adopt key attitudes, learn a set of skills, and be given access to appropriate services.
• Provide HIV education and provide skills as necessary.
• People must feel that their environment is supportive so that they are confident about maintaining their new behaviour and accessing information and services.
• Increase knowledge, challenge stigma and discrimination, encourage community dialogue, promote changes in attitudes, and create demand for information and services.

BCC in HIV
• Through ‘Abstinence, Be Faithful, Condom Use’ (ABC)
• Preventing the spread of sexually transmitted infections
• Encouraging early diagnosis and adherence to treatment
• Seeking prompt care for Opportunistic Infections (OIs)
• Communicating with partners about the need to be tested
• Promoting safer sex, including the use of male and female condoms
• Delaying sexual activity among youth
• BCC programmes should stimulate community dialogue at local and national levels to develop solutions to factors that contribute to the epidemic, such as risk behaviors, poverty, sexually transmitted infections, stigma, local customs and beliefs.

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