Harnessing the Potential of Social Networks

Harnessing the Potential of Social Networks The ABCs of using social network approaches to design and evaluate health & development programs

Overview • What is social network analysis (SNA)? • SNA and intervention design • SNA-based intervention planning • SNA and monitoring & evaluation

Social network analysis: What is it? • A theoretical perspective applied to research and programs • Recognizes that individuals interact with, learn from, and get information from other people • Focuses on relationships, not individuals “Who delivers the message, and in what interpersonal context, may be just as, if no more important, than the message itself, and may result in better, more relevant, and perhaps more effective programs.” - Valente & Fosados, 2006

Social Network Analysis: Theory and Methods • Views world as nodes and • connectors • Key technique in sociology, anthropology, biology, communications, information science

Network grid • For women, probe on: husband, mother, mother-in-law, co-wives • For men, probe on: co-wives, father, male relatives

Entire social network in one village in Bandiagara: Influence Womens Mens Nominated Size = Influence

Distinguishing characteristics of SNA

Why a social network focus? Women and men make decisions not as individuals but as actors in a social system. Social structures are resources to diffuse and support innovations SOCIETY COMMUNITY RELATIONSHIPS INDIVIDUAL

How do networks support diffusion? Single innovator More innovators

Social networks influence diffusion through…. • Social influence • Network members follow norms of gatekeepers to gain approval and avoid conflict. Social learning Network members exchange ideas and information; and evaluate the relative benefits of innovation

Networks and Adoption • Adoption is higher when an individual is: • Highly interconnected • Centrally located in their network • In a network with others who support and practice the innovation • In an open network that supports exposure to new ideas

How do SN interventions differ from conventional outreach approaches? • Focused on changing flow of information and social influence, rather than on individual behavior • Address social norms rather than practices • Work through informal as well as formal leaders to diffuse change through networks • Use influencers/connectors to inform, facilitate comparison, filter conflicting information and model attitudes/behaviors

Using social networks for learning and influence • Opinion Leaders / Leaders Influents • Strategically Targeted Groups / GroupesStratégiquementCiblé • Leaders of Established Groups / Leaders des groupesétablis • SnowballApproach/ Chacun invite trois • Bridges and Connectors / Liaison & connecteurs • Rewiring linkages, ties / Reconfiguration de liens

1. Engaging Opinion Leaders

1. Engaging Opinion Leaders • What it is: • Working with individuals who have formal power (religious leaders, clan leaders, elected officials) • Work with supporters or transform negative opinions into positive ones • Considerations: • Legitimizes innovation • Role models • Addressing norms leads to sustainable change

2. Working with strategically selected groups

2. Strategically Targeted Groups • What it is: • Designing an intervention to be implemented by or within the group • Example: Field workers lead FP discussions during water and sanitation committee meetings • Considerations: • Information travels easily throughout group • Builds on existing connections • Reinforce/support new behaviors • Changing group norms reduces individual risk

3. Working with Leaders of Established Groups

3. Leaders of Established Groups • What it is: • Work with leader of group, who in turn, coordinates/leads the group intervention • Example: Leaders of women’s savings and loans associations trained in FP and asked to discuss during group meetings • Considerations: • Depends on leader’s persuasiveness • Leader may not wish to be “positive deviant”

4. Snowball Approach

4. Snowball Approach • What it is: • One individual informs/influences/invites two friends. Those two individuals reach their friends and so on. • Example: Chacun invite trois , peereducators • Considerations: • Effective in reaching “hard-to-reach” groups • Participants “own” intervention • Model positive “deviant” behavior

5. Activating & Supporting Bridges and Connectors • What it is: • Intervene through individuals who interact with two or more unconnected groups • Create or break bridge ties to strengthen or weaken information diffusion • Example: CBD workers bridges clinics and clients, mothers-in-law bridge FP information to daughter-in-law • Considerations: • Can diffuse information between groups • Bridge persons can be bottlenecks

6. Rewiring Linkages or Ties

6. Rewiring Linkages or Ties • What it is: • Purposely connecting individuals who would otherwise not interact with each other • Example: creating elder learning groups to connect women elders; connecting MOH staff in different technical areas by rearranging office space • Considerations: • Strengthens communication flow • Difficult to purposively change current network

Application of SNA: Study and Plan

Application of SNA: Act

Social Networks in Action: Youth Peer Program • Provide multiple role models and ensure diffusion throughout the network • Selection of peer leaders • with highest # of nomination • who represent cliques • who are bridges

Social Networks in Action:NGO/AIDS and Youth Networks • Map NGOs • who they reach, services, activities • Assessment • Reliance on central coordinating bodies • Need to decentralize to smaller sub-networks • Few youth/minority serving organizations • Strategy: • Build networks of youth organizations beyond NGO/AIDS • Pull from periphery to greater influence

Project TJ Example: Process for designing SN interventions • Formative research identifies structure of social networks and FP attitudes of network members • Visioning exercise • Define intervention goals and objectives • How will the community be different as a result of this program? • What will you see and hear as you walk through the community in five years?

Design Process (cont.) • 4. Develop criteria for selecting SN intervention • Example: scalable, build on existing networks, gender perspective, potential for sustained change • 5. Brainstorm interventions (using resources such as research results, selection criteria, taxonomy of SN approaches) • Identify problem to address (e.g. male opposition) • Brainstorm SN intervention approaches • Prioritize/select intervention(s) • 6. Obtain input from broader group of stakeholders

Tool: Social Network Design Grid Problem: FP use among newly married couples considered unacceptable

Theoretical considerations for measuring innovation diffusion • Need to monitor implementation and change at multiple levels • Theory of change draws from: • Individual behavior change models (Health Belief Model, Trans-theoretical) • Ecological models

Social network approaches to monitoring and evaluation • Monitoring • Include process indicators related to networks • Methods • Ego-centric mapping conducted with a representative sample generalizable to entire population • Measure changes in network structure and member attitudes

Socio-centric network mapping • Explains how information and influence diffuse through entire network • Guides development of interventions to harness social learning and influence

Ego-centered network mapping • Measures the effect of interventions on individual knowledge, attitudes and practices • Identifies changes in the way information and influence diffuse • representative sample generalizable to entire population

Illustrative Outcome Indicators

http://tinyurl.com/terikunda-jekulu Rebecka Lundgren: lundgrer@georgetown.edu

Harnessing the Potential of Social Networks