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Information
and resources >>Health
Communication >> 12 Steps >> Step 5
Step 5: Set communication objectives
In Step 5, we set communication objectives that will support
your overall health promotion strategy (as clarified in Step
2).
About the four levels
We encourage all of our clients to
think about four levels of objectives. Consider, for a
moment, the following:
- Do you believe that an individual can change his/her
behaviour?
- Do you believe that an individual’s behaviours are influenced
by the social, workplace, and community networks to which
they belong?
- Do you believe that the environments in which people eat,
play, work and worship influence their behaviour?
- Do you believe that the laws and regulations of a society/community
influence individual behaviour?
If you believe these to be true, then you agree that there are
multiple levels which influence health, all of which are important:
- Individuals
- Networks
- Organizations
- Communities/Societies
Of course, the levels interact:
- As individuals become concerned about an issue, they will likely
discuss it in their social networks (e.g,. friends and
family), which may eventually lead to changes in organizations such
as worksites, and then to changes in public opinion and laws
at the societal level
- Laws and the physical environment of communities and societies
can also influence individual, network, and organization actions
Working at the four levels
| Level |
Bottom Line Target for Change |
Relevant Theories |
Factors Affecting Bottom Line |
Principle Audiences |
| Individual |
Maintaining a personal behaviour change |
Stages of change
Health belief model |
An individual's knowledge, beliefs, attitudes,
skills, self-efficacy |
Segments most in need of change (based on
demographics, psychographics, etc.) Such as: men, children, low
income groups, smokers, homeless people. |
| Network |
State of the social environment |
Diffusion of innovations |
View of network opinion leaders
Frequency and content of conversations about a health issue
within a network |
Opinion leaders of networks such as: families,
groups of friends, colleagues, team mates. |
| Organization |
Policies |
Organizational theory |
Cost/benefit to industry
General industry trends |
Decision-makers, employees, unions, customers of
organizations such as schools, worksites, places of worship,
primary health care settings. |
| Society |
Formal laws |
Social change theory |
Actions of special interest groups
Media coverage
Public opinion |
Elected officials; the public, special interest
groups, media of a town, region, province or country. |
Sample objectives at the four
levels
| Individual |
Network |
Organizational |
Societal |
| To increase awareness of risk
factors, personal susceptibility, solutions, or health problems
To increase knowledge (or recall, comprehension, analysis,
synthesis) of ideas and/or practices
To increase knowledge of local services, organizations, etc.
To change (increase positive, decrease negative, or maintain)
attitudes
To increase motivation for making and sustaining change
To increase information-seeking behaviour
To increase perceived social support
To increase confidence about making behaviour changes
(self-efficacy)
To increase thinking, social and/or behaviour skills
To change behaviour |
To increase favourable knowledge and
attitudes held by opinion leaders/champions
To increase supportive activity (# of health conversations,
discussions of health issues) by opinion leaders (champions)
To increase number and kinds of health-related interactions
within networks
To increase favourable social influences/norms within
networks
To increase social support for positive changes by network
members
|
To increase the number of
gatekeepers, decision makers and/or other influential people
in organization considering policy changes or adopting specific
programs
To increase the number of gatekeepers, decision makers, other
influential people and/or organizational members (or students,
employees, etc.) who feel that the issue is important and change
is necessary (building an agenda)
To increase the quantity and quality of information regarding
the issue and the policy change required
To increase organizational confidence and competence in
making health-related policy changes
To change/implement policy and/or adopt/change program |
To increase the importance
communities and society attach to an issue, by increasing media
coverage
To increase societal/public values and norms (attitudes and
opinions) which are supportive of the policy change you are
recommending
To increase activity directed to producing policy change,
such as collaboration among community groups
To increase the number of politicians who support the policy
change you are recommending
To change/implement a policy
|
Criteria for good communication
objectives
- Relates to an important program objective that is appropriately
addressed by communication
- Describes an outcome that is realistic for communication,
and for which you will be held accountable
- Describes an outcome that is realistic for communication,
and for which you will be held accountable
- Describes a change (e.g., uses words like increase, decrease)
rather than an action step
- Identifies a specific audience (target group)
- Is a significant change, worthy of being an objective,
that requires selection of vehicles and channels and careful
sequencing, rather than simply being an action step; for example,
distributing information does not describe a significant
change
among a
target audience
- Is located with the right level of change (hint: be guided
by the ultimate change it addresses and the ultimate
target audience, not necessarily by the immediate audience),
for example,
•
If
if addresses personal change, it affects individuals
• If it addresses social influence, it works on informal
social networks
• If it addresses policies and procedures, it
guides organizations
• If it addresses laws and regulations, it influences
governments of communities/societies of varying size
- Is a strategic priority (i.e., a good fit between needs,
capacities and your mandate)
- Is a SMART objective (specific, measurable, attainable,
realistic, time-limited)
THCU resources
Don't
forget to visit the main page for our 12-step
process and review
the step 5 information in our overview of health communication
campaigns workbook and slideshow.
Setting
Communication Objectives Lecturette
This excerpt from our
Overview of Health Communication Campaigns workshop slides provides
guidelines for how to set good health communication objectives.
Information on setting realistic objectives for mass media activities
is also included. (PDF, 183 kb) Added October
9, 2003.
Menu of Outcome Objectives
This supplementary resource suggests objectives for all four levels
-- individual, network, organization, and social. (PDF, 37K) New June 8, 2004
Interactive Campaign Planner
This application will guide you through
steps 5 to 7 of THCU's 12 step process to developing
health communication
campaigns: setting communication objectives, selecting
channels and vehicles, and combining and sequencing events.
This handy tool will allow you to create, save, and print
a full text summary of your campaign, as well as an attractive
visual. These can then be shared and modified at any
time, from any computer!
Added September 22, 2003
Effective
campaign design checklists
No time to read the manual? Use these
checklists to make sure that you've covered the basic principles
of an effective health communication campaign before using
your precious resources: Effective
campaign design checklist for steps 1–4 (Word
64kb, September 2003), Effective
campaign design checklist for steps 5–7 (Word
74kb, October 9, 2003), and checklist
of criteria for developing effective, persuasive health
communication materials in step 8.
Don't forget that there is more information
about this step in our workbook and workshop slide show. Click
here to access these.
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