9/26: Formative Research

This week we focused on learning about the ways of the world...or maybe just the ways of a small group of people that take up a miniscule part of the globe. Irregardless the task is by no means simple. We are all guilty of the occassional people watching at some point in our lives (myself included), and this week we learned about perfecting this method, and doing so in a way in which every meaningful detail can be noted, pondered, coded, and understood for some greater purpose. (Sounds a bit obsessive, but so is the life of a great researcher). Knowing the thoughts, beliefs, behaviors, and vaules of the target population in which you wish to intervene with a program that will prove beneficial (and in turn successful) is essential in behavioral research. It is no simple task to learn all these things about any group in a short amount of time. It truly does take years of practice to perfect this skill.

First a good research goes out and inspects the environment. Here I send a shout out to two of my groupmates, Stephanie and Liz, for going out and doing so. Our group is focusing on promoting healthier food choices in the on campus, dorm-dwelling college population. Stephanie and Liz reported back that they weren't met with the open arms from the cafeteria manager (our first major gatekeeper). "Really? Why not?" I wonder. "Do they have something to hide??? Does the staff know they are serving unhealthy foods to undergraduates?" (Highly doubtful, since college students very well know what is good for them and what is not...at least most of the time.) But I'm sure cafeteria staff don't like us mere MPH students wandering into the cafeteria with our overly do-good, optimistic attitude trying to change the world of college campus dining. Which brings me to my next point (yes it's true, I do have a point). Buy in of key informants and gatekeepers is extremely important in formative research. Yes people want to share their stories, thoughts and opinions. But do they want to share it with just anyone? Or do they ask something in return? What kind of incentives or buy in can a researcher give to gatekeepers for information they feel could be easily criticized? These are the questions that I was met with this week when deciding the best way to approach our nutrition topic with our given population. Hopefully, approaching college students, cafeteria personnell, and possibly our own experience with on campus dining can put the pieces of the puzzle together. Gaining knowledge through various perspectives may help us answer our question: How can we promote healthier food choices in a college population that is surrounded by fast food and/or buffet style eating, and a high affinity for instant gratification?

Week 3 Thoughts

I would also like to start by thanking Stephanie and Liz for going to the cafeteria this week to speak with Gatekeepers. After reviewing my notes from last class again, I feel as though we have a good start at understanding our target population background and attempting to meet with Gatekeepers to gain more insight. I agree with Stephanie that it might better to arrange brief interviews with the other Gatekeepers we had in mind. I also like the idea of actually going to the cafeteria to eat lunch or dinner one day. I think we would benefit greatly from observing students and I think we could more clearly determine other influential ecological factors.

On a side note, I spent some time observing students at my school on Thursday and Friday when I have lunch duty and noticed some interesting things. My school is contracted with an Organics food company so most of the food the kids eat provided by the school is healthy and balanced. I noticed though that with the students that had home-made lunches, there was a mix of healthy and unhealthy components; for example I saw students with sandwiches on whole-wheat bread and then eating sugary fruit snacks and drinking a Monster energy drink or other carbonated beverage. I also noticed that some students did not have lunch that day and did not have money to buy lunch; even more interesting though was that students who were willing to give up some of their food from their lunches were more so willing to give up cut vegetable sticks and packed fruit. While I realize these are high school students, I think there is something to be said about the thought that goes into their food decisions and how that evolves or changes (or doesn't) as these students enter college. I bring this up because I am hypothesizing that for many of the younger college students, the healthier options (as we are focusing on) are going to be a topic of low interest or involvement and we should pay close attention to these trends when we go to the cafeteria, design our campaign materials, and when we do our focus group.

Janice's Reflection #3

First and foremost, I would like to thank Stephanie and Liz for taking time out of their busy schedules and becoming private investigators for our group project. Thanks Ladies!

The first few weeks of this course have proven that proper program planning is essential for a successful program. Even when health program developers are in a time crunch, it is still important to plan a program using focus groups. Being able to communicate with those who are in your program's target population will allow you to be open to new ideas that may have not crossed your mind. In addition, focus groups will let you know what will and will not work in your health campaign. It is crucial to remember that when you're marketing your health campaign, what may have worked for one target population may not work for another. For example, at the beginning of our Delish&Nutrish project, we were going to target 4th and 5th graders at an elementary school. That idea has since changed and we are now going to target undergraduate college students that use our campus' dining halls. The change in our target population changes our ideas for marketing a successful health campaign. It is pertinent that we are up to date with technology as college students are usually at the forefront of the newest innovations. Finding the gatekeepers for our project will be important as well, as these individuals will be able to work with us in providing healthier food options at the dining halls.

It will be helpful for our group to find out what existing educational materials are already being used, as this will save time in our planning process. I feel that the marketing portion of our campaign will be fun as these messages will hopefully assist someone in making their behavior change.

Formative Research

This past Thursday morning, Liz and I set out to begin formative research for our group project. We visited one of the on-campus student dining halls and were able to directly observe the breakfast food offerings. In the photo, you can see the menu and the selected options that were displayed to students as they entered the cafeteria. As we walked around the cafeteria, I was shocked by the limited availability of fresh fruits in the morning and also by the lack of healthy nutritional messages. We observed one wall that displayed framed pictures of fruits and vegetables, a decoration basket full of plastic fruits, a table tent ad promoting a healthy dinner at the cafeteria as part of a study routine, and one print nutritional handout. Ironically, the nutritional handout was placed next to a flowerpot and could potentially be overlooked by students as they passed by.

Liz introduced herself to the cafeteria manager (a "gatekeeper") and told her about our group project. But the manager stated she was unavailable at that time. The manager suggested that we return to the cafeteria for lunch of dinner sometime for our own experience and to observe students' behaviors. Initially I received this suggestion as a mere brush-off. But it might actually be something for us to consider in order to understand on-campus students behavioral characteristics and psychographics. I think it is also important for us as a group to contact other potential "gatekeepers" (ex. Housing & Dining Services, Residential Life, Student Life, etc.) in advance via email or phone to inform them of our project and interest in setting-up a brief interview. I'm personally interested in finding out how "gatekeepers" feel about sending healthy nutritional messages to students in the cafeteria since so few were found.

Reflection: week 2

This week we discussed how formative research helps drive interventions. an interesting aspect to this not previously considered by moi, is that formative research is theory driven.  There are multiple avenues one can take as well as different kinds of formative research.  The three main types of formative research are focus groups, indepth interviews and surveys.  In public health we use surveys as the most common tool in gathering data before implementing interventions.  In our nutritional group, we need to conduct formative research in order to find out what are the demographics, psychographics and what the primary concerns of the population we mean to target are.  The population in which we have decided to administer a media campaign to are SDSU college students living on campus between the ages of 18-24.  Nutirtion within this group is usually overlooked due to many reasons.  Some reasons why their nutrition may be overlooked does not necessarily have to do with the fact that it is not important but rather that there is an implied assumption that their needs are being met and that the school and dining services are following the national nutritional guidelines.  thinking about that, i can only wonder if the natioanl nutritional guidelines are sufficent for this target population.  Are there differences between grade school nutrtion, high school nutrition and college nutrition?

Stephanie E and I visited the dining hall on campus this morning.  I was appalled at the selection.  The only real options were waffles (made by students themsevles with premixed batter in pre-portioned cups) and an omlete bar.  The fruit offered was canned and the bread was all white or sourdough.  There was only one healthy cereal option and *surprise!* there was no nutritional information available about any of the foods offered.

When organizing our project i think it will be key to use indepth interviews with key informants and gatekeepers to discover what the real issues are.

Janice's Reflection #2

Knowing the involvement (high or low) of our target population is going to be a crucial aspect of our project. It will likely be both (high and low involvement) since it (personal view on health) is dependent on each individual child. The Braverman article in this week's reading was useful in deciphering which message transportation (emotional connection) route should be used. Modes such as audio vs. written and information vs. testimonial will allow us to get the health message(s) through to our group. Since the group of school children we're choosing will be around the ages of 9 & 10, we will have to grasp an understanding of how to incorporate the most useful transportation routes for both low and high involvement to make our project efficient and, most importantly, effective.

It will be a challenge getting these students to increase their fruit and vegetable consumption, a main reason being that they are not the ones purchasing groceries for their household. Also, if they purchase a school lunch, the children are, once again, not in control of what is on the menu. I think it will be important for our group conduct formative research with the parents, 4th and 5th grade teachers, and the school's nutritionist as well. In the end, the adults have a major impact on what foods children are consuming as they are role models in the lives of these children.

Reflection for 9/19

I found this week's readings about marketing and communication to be very interesting. I have always been interested in marketing and communication but had never really though about how marketing specifically applies to health. I enjoyed reading this article mostly for the distinction that was made between how communication and marketing can be used to affect change among people and places. I also think this has made me more aware when I am watching TV, or reading the newspaper and magazines of what is advertizing, communication and or marketing.

As Manpreet pointed out, after reading the Braverman article I was also intruiged to find that for people with low invovlment testimonials and audio were the most effective means of information transmission. However, when I think about the student population for our specific project I am interested to see how we can take this information and prepare meaningful, and age appropriate communication materials. I like Manpreet's idea to create different messages for different levels of student invovlment and think this is something we should definitely do. One thing I have been thinking about in terms of our target audience and how we are going to transmit this information is if the best way (and most feasible way) would be to do it in print? This is something I will continue to think about until our group meets again and we discuss the aspects of our project more specifically.

9/19 Reflection

The Braverman article about testimonial vs. informational messages led me to reflect on my work environment at Planned Parenthood. In the clinic waiting room, testimonial messages are presented via the television while printed pamphlets and posters offer lots of factual information. The TV programming is developed by the agency and seeks to provide both factual and testimonial audio/visual information to people who are seated in the waiting room. Some of the TV testimonials, like one segment that highlights a young person talking about their experience of STI testing, are framed in such a way to appeal to the emotional investment or "transportation" of the viewers. After reading the article, I learned how different types of messages in the waiting room could potentially be absorbed by people based on their level of involvement and interest. The discussion from the three different studies in the article helped me to understand why some people who visit the waiting room may or may not be interested in reading a pamphlet and/or listening to the TV programming.

In previous courses, I had heard about the theory of Diffusion of Innovation but never really understood how it was applied. Therefore, I thought the discussion in class about the process of adopting an innovation and the different segments of people who are involved (trendsetters, early majority, laggards, etc.) was quite interesting. The visual representation helped me better grasp the idea behind the theory.

I'm excited to explore different types of messages and channels with 4th and 5th grade students for our group project. The some of PSAs that we viewed in class were pretty creative and varied in approach. Maybe as a group we could brainstorm some PSA ideas to increase fruit and veggie consumption among our target population?

Reflection for 9/15/10

This week's article Braverman (2008) was very useful. The idea of transportation, or emotional connection, between a message and the receiver is something I had never really thought about. I mean it would make sense, but it is useful to know that there is an article that has studied and shown a relation between the impact of the message and certain characteristics used. I didn't know audio and testimonials would work best with people with low involvement, and written and informational messages are more useful for those who have high involvement. This article really helps me gain a better understanding of what our group should include/look for in our formative research. For students, we should try to gauge how involved students are in their own health, and how important they feel diet is to their health. Maybe it would be best to create different messages stating the same concept for both high and low involvement students to ensure a greater impact on our population. It also made me more aware of how messages affect my perceptions and change my opinions. I am more aware of how informational messages do affect me more when they are on topics I am concerned about, and how other topics need to take a different approach.

I also feel the video clips were extremely helpful in providing us with different examples on how to get our points across. I think referring to thetruth.com and the ad council website would be extremely helpful in developing ideas on how to approach our target audience in an affective way and leaving an impact and being memorable, without being over the top. I feel this would be our biggest challenge, but if done properly, a big accomplishment.

Reflection: Week 1

Signing up for a class about communication, I thought I already knew everything there was to know.  However, after the first two class meetings I am surprised at how much I have to learn.  After reading the extremely dense and frankly tedious article by Scholten, I was a little discouraged.  Upon completion of Lyn's presentation I actually seemed even more confused, but I know there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  The distinctive theories behind Health Promotion Comm are necessary to achieve total success and must be utilized properly.  I hope to learn more about the different routes and absorption methods.  The most interesting tidbit I picked up this week was about back-door routes.  Whereas a message is being delivered in such a manner that the target has no idea they were just given a health promotion message.  I like this concept for working with young adults I think it will be more successful than the traditional scare tactics and fact-spitting.
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During the 'Code Your Own Communication' assignment I was surprised but not shocked by the number of negative health messages Las Vegas bombards you with.  From free alcohol, open smoking casinos and hotel rooms, to prostitutes to your door in "20 mins or less" (or so says their t-shirts) the messages and prompts for unhealthy living are everywhere.  Being in that environment for 4 days, I myself fell victim to many advertisements and gimmicks geared at the casinos making money.  Discouraging as it may be, I know that there is a way to reach the people in a matter that will captivate, entertain and engage them so that unpopular health related messages can be administered "painlessly" to put it one way.
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Regarding the group topic, I am excited to work on a nutrition campaign.  Previously within the health promotion department I have stuck to my previous interests of sexual health and substance abuse.  During this semester I hope to expand my repertoire and bring a fresh and new attitude to nutrition campaigns.  Hopefully this class will give me the experience and practice i need to develop a successful healthy eating program to use on my resume to exemplify my skills.

First Impressions

Within the first two weeks of this course, I already feel my awareness of the messages around me heighten, especially after the Code Your Own Communication assignment. I found this assignment very useful and eye opening. It forced me to pay closer attention to the different messages I face in my daily life, and really analyze what they are trying to tell me. I never realized how few messages I actually devote my full attention to. I also was surprised in seeing how the health messages on television focus on prescription medications and dieting. Another aspect that really surprised me was I couldn’t believe how few advertisements and health messages were focused on prevention, which was a little disheartening (but also quite motivating at the same time) as a health promotion student. We discussed in class how lots of media messages have no organization or method behind their design, and I agree that using theory as a backbone to our campaigns will prove a key component in their success. I’m eager to start our nutrition campaign, which I hope will not fall through the cracks, but rather leave a lasting impression on those who get a chance to view it.

Janice's Reflection

Since the first day of lecture in PH663, I already had a feeling that this course would be interesting since it allows us to let our 'creative juices' flow. I, personally, have an appreciation for advertisements that are successful in getting one's attention as well as allowing the message to cycle in one's mind, allowing the person to take the message and possibly using it in their own life. As a student learning about Public Health, I acknowledge that 'prevention' is a hard sell to society. These days, much of the advertisements that filter through the different media channels contain a message about 'treatment.' I am excited to learn a new skill set in marketing the prevention of health issues with negative impacts. It is important to know your target audience and figure out if the health issue is a low or high issue for the specific audience. This is will guide the way a person in the health field goes about their campaign.

1st blog entry

I found this week's lecture about communication theories interesting. The Scholten article was a little difficult for me to understand at first. But after the lecture in class I felt I grasped a better understanding of IPM and ELM. Honestly, I had not consciously considered the social marketing aspects of health promotion before this class. Now I'm realizing that without good campaign strategies and effective advertising to attract the target audience, implementation of behavioral health interventions and/or programs can be difficult to accomplish. The code your communication exercise made me evaluate how I absorb health communication and exchange information with others. I hope to apply what I learned from this exercise in the upcoming group projects and beyond the classroom.

Reflection for 9/12/10

I learned a lot this second week of Health Communication. In particular, I found the Scholten article interesting. I had never really thought about the transmission modes of information in communication before this article and our "code your communication" assignment. I thought the aspect of low issue importance being communicated via the peripheral route was interesting in that people really are not thinking about the message so much as they are thinking about the source or who is giving the message. When I think about PSAs with celebrities now I understand a little more why they use these celebrities to discuss issues that are not at the forefront of peoples' thinking. I think it will be interesting to use this knowledge in designing a school based nutrition awareness campaign, although I think our group has more planning to do in terms of how exactly we are going to deliver such a low issue topic to teenagers.