Module One Reflections

Hi everyone!

I hope your gatekeeper interviews are coming along! Here are my a-has and insights from our first module. Enjoy! :)

Top Insights
1) Five Dimensions of Communication/McGuire's IPM (source, message, channel, receiver, destination); communication processes contribute to health change
2) How theory can inform our communication messages
3) Central route vs. Peripheral route
4) Diffusion of Innovations
5) Psychographics Characteristics
6) Grids: segmentation and situational analysis

Reflection on Top Three Insights
In this module there were quite a few insights I had. I don't think that there was any particularly "new" material presented but what was presented was presented in a "new" way that really highlighted what I think other courses have tried to capture.

I think that most of us in Health Promotion understand the use of psychographics and how target populations and audience segmentation can be, and is, used to inform some promotion campaigns. The general understanding is that for an audience to be responsive and receptive to a message, the message must be framed in a way that "speaks to them". But, equally important as the measurements and integration of psychographics is the Five Dimensions of Communication, or McGuire's IPM. We acknowledge that how we say something is important, but what we sometimes forget is the channels through which or the methods through which we communicate is just as important. If we have a greatly tailored message in a print ad but our population doesn't read, then the message is lost. This, of course, is a very obvious example, but even in its more subtle forms, it can miss the target population just as much. This is definitely something that I will always keep in the back of my head when creating and disseminating health communication messages.

Another insight I had in this module is how theory can also inform your message and communication campaign. In 661 we talked a lot about how theory informs research and running labs to see if a campaign in successful, but we rarely, if ever, spoke to how we can use theory to tailor our message. The most succinct example is the Stages of Change and Transtheoretical Models. It seems like common sense, but sometimes we take common sense for granted. Obviously someone who is preparing to change (stage three) will respond differently to an ad providing behavior modifications (Walk at least 30 minutes a week!) versus an ad that is targeting precontemplation or contemplation audience members (Exercising can increase your energy!), but this isn't always taken into account. Even in the beginning of our own project, we strayed away from this a bit and it was only after an a-ha moment that we realized we would need different messages for people at different stages. I think it would be interesting to see examples of communication messages directed at different stages or informed by different theories. This way we can get a concrete understanding of how message a is different from message b even if they both have the same goal and are informed by the same theory.

The third insight I had in this module is the idea of the central route vs. the peripheral route of health communication for creating and tailoring messages. Again, it is something that is so important but could easily be missed. How will our audience best respond to our message? Like the examples given in class, DUI offenders are more affected by a central route message (you could kill someone) and frat boys might be more affected by a peripheral route (a DUI is expensive). When you start to look at your population, and their psychographics, you end up seeing more and more where there investment is in this issue, if they even have any.

Each of these aspects are integral to a successful health communication campaign. Taken together they give a strong overview of your target audience and how you are best to reach them (what sort of message [do they care about x or y], is the message to aid in behavior change or to get them thinking about it [where are they in the SOC model?], what should the message say, portray or show, and through what channel will it a) reach the largest portion of your audience and b) will it be most respected and well received?). All three of these components are definitely steps of health communication planning that I aim to integrate into such projects.

Lastly, while all three of these are invaluable, it can get confusing and overwhelming to remember and track. And that's why the a-ha tool for me this module is the grid! The grid is so helpful and lays out all the different components in a clear and easy to read way. It gives a visual representation of with what you are working. Both the situational analysis and audience segmentation grids are so helpful and will definitely be tools to which I return again and again!

Lingering Questions
At this time, my only lingering questions are ones that I've stated before. We didn't do a Needs Assessment on our population, we haven't done any audience segmentation in the sense that we don't even know if the issue we chose (energy drink consumption) is of any importance to our target population (SDSU undergraduate students). I don't have the fancy words to describe it but essentially we could have the most concrete information, the best messages ever and hit every mark in ways of tailoring, but if we don't have community buy-in and no one really thinks it's that big of a problem, what good will our campaign do? If we are looking at merely raising awareness, then I think we can still head in this direction, but I think that motivating and inspiring behavioral change in decreasing consumption of energy drinks isn't very realistic at this point and time. I wonder, then, how this all goes together...