HEALTH COMMUNICATION

Health communication is process by which people became aware about health issue. This health related massages people will get from experts. To make a successful a communication program it must be based on the desire of the audience. Clear communication is essential to successful public health practice at every level of the ecological model; intrapersonal, interpersonal, group, organizational. To help with planning and developing a health communication program, National Cancer instute have divided the process into four stages:

1. Planning and Strategy Development;

2. Developing and Pretesting Concepts, Messages, and Materials;

3. Implementing the Program; and

4. Assessing Effectiveness and Making Refinements.

(Source-www.cancer.gov)

The stages constitute a circular process in which the last stage feeds back into the first as it work through a continuous loop of planning, implementation, and improvement.

Behavior Change Communication (BCC):

BCCis a process of working with individuals, communities and societies to:

- develop communication strategies to promote positive behaviors;

AND

- Provide a supportive environment which will help people to get positive behaviors.

Different target groups will require different approaches. Therefore, when making decisions about which target groups and which factors to address, it is necessary to consider:
 which target groups are most vulnerable;

 which risk / vulnerability factors are most important;

 which factors may be related to the impact of conflict and displacement;

 which target groups and risk / vulnerability factors the community wants to address;

 what could be motivators for behavior change;

 what could be barriers to behavior change;

 what type of messages will be meaningful to each target group;

 which communication media would best reach the target group;

 which services/resources are accessible to the target group;

 which target groups and risk / vulnerability factors are feasible in terms of expertise, resources and time.

Source - Control of Sexually Transmitted Diseases. Chapter 4: An approach to effective communication.)

A recent analysis by UNHCR of behavioral studies in a number of refugee camps found that the methodology often needed improvement.
“…Research and proper planning form the foundation of an effective communication campaign. Knowing the needs of the population and the best means of reaching that audience are crucial in achieving the goal of raising awareness and, ultimately, changing attitudes and behaviors…The key is to determine the needs and desires of the audience, then deliver messages and products that offer real benefits. Many social change campaigns fail because the message is not meaningful or relevant and consequently not motivating to members of the target audience…” (Source - Control of Sexually Transmitted Diseases. Chapter 4: An approach to effective communication.)

PORTRAIT of WOMEN in BANGLADESHI MEDIA

Women of Bangladesh are running forward with enthusiasm and eagerness. Basically in media, where few years back only a small number of women work now the area is changed drastically. It’s encouraging that females are coming ahead. But the question is; are they playing the role of policy maker? Is it the picture of whole Bangladesh? And the answer will without any doubt ‘NO’. Still all the big post is grabbed by male because a common picture of thinking is are women able to play the key role, whereas they are doing very good job. Outside of Dhaka only few newspaper and other media office has few female journalist where they are not able to do the job. The attitude of the guardian are also affected their children to chose it as a profession. In electronic media women’s are portrait as a only a product for an example in the promotion program of ‘Bablu tooth pest’ in NTV, it was hard to notify which one is the commodity the female models or the tooth pest.

SOCIAL MARKETING:

Social marketing is the systematic application of marketing, along with other concepts and techniques, to achieve specific behavioral goals for a social good. Social marketing can be applied to promote merit goods, or to make a society avoid demerit goods and thus to promote society's well being as a whole (source-Wikipedia). For example, this may include asking people not to smoke in public areas, asking them to use seat belts, or prompting to make them follow speed limits.So Social marketing implies the technique of marketing to sell their social commodities among the community people to make awareness against any harmful activities. And their aim is to change the behavior according to their product.
4ps of social marketing:

Here let’s imagine a society where we work as ‘B’ organization. And our goal is to bring change the behavior towards smoking. And it’s obviously a trail version-

Place: Any city of Bangladesh.

Product: Anti-smoking chocolate.

Price: Free for trail version.

Promotion: The procedure will be made aware of the product and its availability as well as the evil effect of smoking and thus the awareness will make the society members be going to accept the product..

Entertainment education:

Entertainment education is the process to make people conscious about a specific issue. And it is known as the most effective and easiest way to provoke people about the concerning matter. To promote entertainment education both media advocacy and social marketing can be used as a tool to informed people the information. There are several examples of entertainment education in our country, they are- Sisimpur, Best shot.
Sisimpur:

it is a puppet show for children education. It is on air in every Friday in the morning. Producers set the goal as to teach different manners, how to build playing stuffs, education related gossip including many information to educate our children.
Best shot:

it is a movie related program on RTV. The team work for educate people as well as to create interest among the people about compact cinema. They show different best clips with film aesthetics and film language to make people aware about cinema.