Recall of the Promoted Messages

The indicator measures the proportion of the target population that recall hearing or seeing a minimum number of the messages promoted by the project’s social and behaviour change communication (SBCC) activities. It helps you understand how large a proportion of the target audience our communication activities reached. The data required for this indicator must be collected no longer than a few weeks after your SBCC campaign is over.

Determine the indicator’s value by using the following methodology:

1) Write a list of the main messages that were communicated by the SBC communication activities. 

2) Decide on the minimum number of messages a respondent had to hear or see to be considered "hearing or seeing the promoted messages". For example, at least 4 out of 8 messages. Considering pretesting the benchmark to avoid setting it unrealistically high or unnecessarily low. 

3) Conduct individual interviews with a representative sample of the target group members assessing whether they recall hearing or reading the promoted messages and from which source they heard / read them:

RECOMMENDED SURVEY QUESTIONS (Q) AND POSSIBLE ANSWERS (A)

Introduction: In the following questions, I will be asking whether you heard or saw certain messages. When I asked these questions to other people living in this area, they told me when they recalled a message but they also told me openly when they have not heard or seen such a message. I would like to ask you to respond to the following question as honestly as the other respondents did. There are no right or wrong answers, we just want to understand your true experience.

Q1: In the past [specify the time frame], have you heard from someone or have you seen somewhere the following message: [specify the message]?

A1: yes / no / does not remember

(ask the following question only if the previous answer is “yes”)

Q2: Where did you see or hear this message? Probe: Did you hear or see it anywhere else?

A2: Pre-define the answers based on the communication channels your activities used (such as from an extension worker, radio, billboard, etc.). Include also additional sources, such as the respondent’s friends and relatives, and option “does not remember”.

4) Replicate the same questions for the other selected messages.

5) Count the number of messages the respondent has seen or heard from one or more sources your SBCC activities used (do not count any other sources; do not count the respondents who claimed that they heard / saw the message but did not remember where).

6) Count the number of respondents who read or heard the minimum pre-defined number of messages (e.g. 4 out of 8) from any of the sources your SBCC activities used (do not count people that claim to have heard or seen the message from a source that your campaign did not use). 

7) To calculate the indicator’s value, divide the number of respondents who saw or heard the minimum number of messages from any of the sources your SBCC activities used, by the total number of respondents. Multiply the result by 100 to convert it to a percentage.

Disaggregate the data by age group, location, and any other criteria depending on the focus of your intervention. 

1) An alternative way of measuring the indicator would be to ask the respondent to recall all the messages s/he heard about a given topic. For example Q1: Can you please recall any messages about child nutrition that you heard in the past [specify the timeframe]?" Then you use Q2 to verify where has the respondent heard or seen each message. The advantage of this approach is that the respondent is less likely to say that s/he has heard or seen a message even though it was not true. Its disadvantage is that even though a respondent heard / saw multiple messages, s/he might not be able to recall them at the time of the interview. As a result, the indicator's value will be lower than it should be. Neutral probing can help, e.g. "What else have you heard or seen about child nutrition in the past 3 months?".

2) Do not collect the data as a standard part of your project’s endline survey – it is likely to be too late. The data must be collected at the latest 2-3 weeks after your SBCC activities are implemented, otherwise, it is very likely that people will not remember them. The data collection needs to be planned at the time when you plan the implementation of the various SBCC activities. Remember: the indicator does not measure the proportion of people who increased their knowledge or changed behaviour as a result of the communication activities - it only measures the proportion of people who were reached by the activities.