Audience research before a campaign
Surveys, interviews and community discussions establish what an audience already knows, whom it trusts, which languages and channels it uses, and which groups are missed, before any message is written.
GCRI · Campaigns
Social and behavioural science for campaigns
Social and behavioural science is the core discipline of this platform. It explains how people perceive risk, judge sources, take part and act, and it supplies the survey, interview and experimental methods used to research audiences, test material and evaluate campaigns without overstating what they achieved.
01Contents
Social and behavioural science for campaigns in five parts.
02Application
What social and behavioural science does here.
Social and behavioural science studies how individuals, groups and institutions think, act and organise. It explains vulnerability, risk perception, compliance and collective response to shocks. In information and public trust and society and human development, social science identifies who is exposed and less able to cope, and why warnings are or are not acted upon. It informs equitable design of policies and interventions across interconnected risks. The canonical description is on the STEM Commons.
Pre-testing material for comprehension
Draft explainers and notices are tested through cognitive interviews and comprehension tasks with members of the intended audience, and revised until the meaning people report back is the one intended.
Evaluation with a comparison group
Randomised, stepped or matched designs compare people reached with similar people not yet reached, measuring understanding and observed action separately, with the analysis plan registered in advance.
03Monitor
Survey analysis.
The screen a team would use to follow this method: its measures, states and decisions. Names are examples and values are illustrative.
Survey analysis
Campaigns · Social and behavioural science · Run R-0626
Estimates stableGCRI · Campaigns
Estimates
robust standard errors
| People reached | 0.63 | 0.18 | [−0.4, 0.3] | No |
| Knowledge gain | 0.36 | 0.06 | [−0.2, 0.2] | No |
| Consent records complete | −0.14 | 0.14 | [−0.5, 0.3] | No |
| Preparedness actions taken | 0.64 | 0.03 | [−0.2, 0.9] | Yes |
Method card
- Method
- Social and behavioural science
- Sample
- 11,913 obs
- Design
- stratified, weighted
- Label
- MODELLED
Residuals by group
04Data
What the method consumes.
Datasets and records used by social and behavioural science on this platform, with the role each plays and the label its values carry. Sources are listed in the source register.
| Data | Role | Label |
|---|---|---|
| Opinion and trust surveys | Baseline awareness, trust and media use by group | REPORTED |
| Cognitive interview transcripts | How material is understood in people’s own words | OBSERVED |
| Census and language statistics | Audience composition and denominators for reach | Published statistics |
| Platform researcher access data | Exposure to and spread of public content | OBSERVED |
| Consent and participation registers | Who took part and on what terms | DECLARED |
05Methods and evidence
How social and behavioural science for campaigns is modelled, measured and tested.
The model, its assumptions, its data and its uncertainty, in the form a scientist or engineer would check. Structures follow published methods. The values drawn are illustrative, not findings.
Model, equations and assumptions
The model structure used for social and behavioural science for campaigns, the assumptions it makes and how each is tested.
Risk of element i
Ri = f(Hi, Ei, Vi, Ci)hazard, exposure, vulnerability and coping capacityExpected annual loss
EAL = ∑k pk · Lkover events k with annual probability pkCoupled systems
xt+1 = A xt + B ut + εtA carries the couplings, u the shock, ε the error| Assumption | Why it is made | How it is tested |
|---|---|---|
| Hazard and exposure are independent within an event | Keeps the loss integral tractable | Compare with a copula fit on joint records |
| Couplings are linear near the operating point | Lets shocks propagate through A | Perturb beyond the linear range and compare |
| Vulnerability curves transfer between places | Local curves are rarely available | Validate against observed losses where they exist |
- Inputs
- versioned datasets with provenance
- Outputs
- distributions, never single numbers
- Code
- released with the model card and tests
- Reproduction
- same data, code, environment and seed
FAIR guiding principles · GO FAIR and FORCE11W3C PROV · World Wide Web ConsortiumGuidance on consistent treatment of uncertainties · IPCCCEOS Analysis Ready Data · Committee on Earth Observation Satellites
06Validation
How results are checked.
Findings are tested through replication, triangulation of methods and pre-registered designs. Measurement instruments are checked for reliability and validity.
| Check | How it is done |
|---|---|
| Instrument validity | Questions are piloted, translated with back-translation and cognitive testing, and checked for reliability before fielding |
| Pre-registration | Hypotheses, outcomes and analysis are registered before data collection; deviations are reported |
| Representativeness | Sample composition is compared with census benchmarks, and weights are reported with the results |
| Triangulation | Survey, interview and observational evidence are compared before a conclusion is stated |
Behaviour is context dependent and may change under stress. Self-reported data carry recall and social desirability biases.
07Process
How the process runs.
Process
Social and behavioural science for campaigns: PRISMA 2020 review reporting
PRISMA 2020 is a reporting guideline for systematic reviews; the steps follow its checklist, not a mandated sequence, and no Nexus document adopts it.
01 Plan
- 01Registration and protocolRecord · The review teamThe guideline asks for registration details, access to the protocol and any amendments.
- 02Eligibility criteriaRecord · The review teamThe guideline asks for the inclusion and exclusion criteria and how studies were grouped.
02 Find and select
- 03Search: sources and strategiesStep · The review teamThe guideline asks for the information sources and the full search strategies. It does not fix which sources are used.
- 04Selection of studiesStep · The review teamThe guideline asks how studies were judged eligible, including how many reviewers screened. It does not fix the number of reviewers.
- 05Flow diagramRecordThe flow diagram shows the number of records found, the number of studies included and the reasons for exclusion.
03 Analyse
- 06Data collectionStep · The review teamThe guideline asks how data were collected from reports and which data items were sought.
- 07Risk of biasStep · The review teamThe guideline asks for the methods and tools used to assess risk of bias.
- 08SynthesisModel · The review teamThe guideline asks for the effect measures and the synthesis methods. It does not prescribe meta-analysis.
- 09Certainty of evidenceStep · The review teamThe guideline asks for the methods used to assess certainty, and reports the result per outcome. It does not name a grading scale.
04 Report
- 10Review reportRecordThe guideline helps authors report why the review was done, what they did and what they found.
ReportsOutline of an externally published reporting guideline, not a Nexus process and not a record of operation. PRISMA 2020 mainly covers reviews of intervention effects. No Nexus page names it. Every programme is at service level R0.
08Connections
Topics that rely on this method.
09Stewardship
Who maintains the method.
Society and Human Development stewards social and behavioural science for the Consortium and reviews how it is applied across platforms.
10Connected
Where this page leads across the Consortium.
11Questions
Questions and answers.
What are the limits of social and behavioural science in this field?
Behaviour is context dependent and may change under stress. Self-reported data carry recall and social desirability biases.
How are results checked?
Findings are tested through replication, triangulation of methods and pre-registered designs. Measurement instruments are checked for reliability and validity.
Are the values on this page real?
The data names, roles and checks are real descriptions of practice. The canvas shows a design of the method’s use, not a run; no result is reported here.
Where else is this method applied?
The canonical method page lists every platform that applies it.
ReportsContribute
Contribute evidence from this page.
Reports is the Consortium’s quarterly publication. What you know about this subject can become evidence, a case or a correction in the next edition, credited to you and published under CC BY 4.0 where it is your own work.
GCRICampaignsEvidence Brief
- EmailGateway GW-GCRISend it from this pageEvidence, a correction, a case, a method, a review, a translation or profile input. It arrives tagged with this page, so the editor who owns it receives it.
- ZenodoOpen depositDeposit it and submit to the communityPublish your own record on Zenodo with your ORCID iD, then submit it to the Reports community there. Curators review it; the DOI stays yours.
- ReportsGCRISee every way to contributeThe contribution types, how each is reviewed, what credit you receive, the licence and what is never accepted.
Never send personal data, sensitive infrastructure detail or anything you have no right to share. A contribution is reviewed before use; sending it confers no authorship or editorial rights, and sponsorship never buys a finding.
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