Making Mass Media Personal: Media Mix in a Changing Environment

This presentation examines the strategies developed by Population Media Center (PMC), a nonprofit organisation working to improve the lives of people globally using entertainment-education soap operas on radio and TV. The long-running TV and radio shows are designed to have cliffhangers at the end of each show so that the storylines extend over numerous episodes. In developing countries where radio is prevalent, PMC's ideal format is a 156-episode series broadcast over the course of 1.5 years. In more complex media markets, digital or TV shows are required, and the number of episodes varies depending on PMC's broadcast or distribution partner.

Barker begins by stressing that PMC shows first and foremost are designed to be entertaining. They seek to get the audience involved in characters and storylines such that the audience comes to PMC vs. PMC going to the audience.

Role modeling is another key PMC strategy. In PMC dramas, characters show different behaviours/choices and different consequences in the hope of sparking conversation among the audience members and modeling information about outcomes. The aim is to allow people to understand connections between behaviours and consequences and see a variety of behaviours/consequences so that they might come to their own decisions. It also exposes audiences to what may happen if they choose to do something they have never done before - what will the visit to the health clinic be like? - which helps prepare them for pursuit of the ideal behaviour and alleviate some of the fear of the unknown. They know that some things will be difficult to achieve, and this preparation increases their sense of self-efficacy and resilience.

The characters vacillate between positive and negative role models throughout the story, which evokes both the traditional storytelling hero's journey and what real life is like. Because the story is spread over many episodes, the audience is continually left at cliffhangers of the interwoven stories. The audience hopes for certain outcomes for certain characters because of their emotional attachments to the characters. This also stimulates interpersonal conversation as people talk with other members of the audience about what they hope for or how they judge certain characters or behaviours and why.

Barker contends that stories, especially long-running ones, are an effective vehicle for addressing personal, emotional, and deeply entrenched beliefs within individuals and societies. "Stories have the power to inspire. Stories create a safe space, a fictional world, where ideas can be expressed and exhibited without personal risk. The stories show nuances and different perspectives to enable understanding. They also show how hard some issues or realities of our lives can be to change, but that change is possible and what steps might be required to do that. Again, this is about building knowledge and desire to change, then building self-efficacy (instilling the sense that people have the power to control or change) and resilience for when the change is difficult, and then giving the audience the concrete steps and tools within the community to assist with those changes. [The a]udience can learn and feel vicariously, and the lessons are based on emotional appeals, not logic or reasoning, not lecturing. People care for the characters and their journeys."

Another difference between what PMC does and 30- to 60-second public service announcements (PSAs) is that PMC's methodology allows for interplay between different related issues, and for the presentation of unrelated issues. In a typical PMC programme, there can be 4 storylines, each addressing a major issue. Then, there are also sub-issues within the storylines. PMC's strategy of weaving multiple issues together is designed to enhance audience understanding of each issue and better prepare audience members to be motivated and able to change.

Barker proceeds to share some impact data from evaluations of PMC's long-running dramas. Examples (for more, see Related Summaries, below) include:

• Umurage Urukwiye - Listeners were: 1.5 times more likely than non-listeners to cite population growth as the primary cause of environmental degradation and loss of gorilla habitat; 1.5 times more likely than non-listeners to have talked with their spouse or partner in the past 3 months about the connection between family planning and conservation of natural resources; and 1.6 times more likely than non-listeners to know that protection of gorillas and their habitat can reduce poverty and bring tourists.
• Ruwan Dare - Listeners were 5.7 times as likely as non-listeners to say they did not want another child (endline vs. baseline) and 4.5 times as likely as non-listeners to have spousal discussion of family planning (endline vs. baseline); they were also 1.6 times as likely as non-listeners to think that "children 12-14 should be taught about using condoms to avoid AIDS".
• Saliwansai - This drama reached an estimated 3 million listeners, 987,654 of whom started using bednets to prevent malaria. The estimated cost for this theme of the drama was US$1.62 for each person that began using a bednet.

East Los High featured transmedia elements, and Barker showed a reel illustrating how the media mix is crucial for reaching audiences and the story extensions are crucial for inspiring interpersonal communication, even if it is digitally with others or with PMC/the show. This is a key part of PMC's theory of change because it is that audience engagement – taking a stand on an issue(s) and communicating it – that solidifies change, Barker suggests.

Editor's note: The above is a summary of a presentation delivered by Kriss Barker at Shifting Norms, Changing Behaviour, Amplifying Voice: What Works? The 2018 International Social and Behavior Change Communication (SBCC) Summit featuring Entertainment Education, held April 16-20 2018 in Nusa Dua, Indonesia.

Click here to access the 11-slide presentation.