Understand similarities and differences between Community Engagement and Community Development processes and related approaches within this guide.
Understand key considerations for deciding the appropriate approach for working with communities within this Communities for Animals Guide.
Understand key concepts and best practices in effective Community Engagement and Community Development processes.
Understand recommendations based on lessons learned from the field tips for promoting effective community engagement and development processes for changing behaviour to improve animal welfare.
1.1 Defining Community Engagement and Community Development
The term “community” in the context of this Communities for Animals (C4A) resource refers to a group of people within a particular geographical area, often referred to as the target or priority population. However, more broadly, community can be understood as a group of people living in the same defined area, sharing the same basic values, organization, interests or shared sense of identity [34, 35]. Understanding the characteristics which define and shape animal owning communities will be important to helping you determine the type of approach and methods best suited for working with them.
The terms community development (CD) and community engagement (CE) refer to different participatory processes or approaches for working with communities. While these terms may also be used to refer to outcomes of processes, within this guide they are used solely to refer to the processes or approaches themselves [36].
Definition of Community Development ‘Community Development’ (CD) refers to “a process where community members come together to take collective action and generate solutions to common problems” [37, 38]. In in the context of animal welfare, the goal is to empower community members to work together to improve their animals’ welfare by addressing the root causes of animals’ welfare issues.
Definition of Community Engagement ‘Community Engagement’ (CE) refers to a process through which community participation in decision making occurs, without any explicit aim of collective action as is implicit to a community development process [36, 39]. A generally accepted working definition of community engagement is the process of working collaboratively with and through people affiliated by geographic proximity, special interest, or similar situations to address issues affecting their well-being” [40]. In in the context of animal welfare, a community engagement process seeks to facilitate community participation in addressing the issues and affecting the welfare of their animals.
1.2 Key Concepts in Community Engagement and Development
To facilitate community engagement or development process that ensure the diverse perspectives and experiences of different individuals and social groups within a community are valued and considered, it is important to understand the key concepts outlined in the sections below, along with their implications for changing behaviour change to improve animal welfare.
COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION
Community participation is an essential element of any community engagement or development process [38, 41, 42]; however to effectively achieve it, one must first be clear about the goal of community participation. To clarify the role and influence of the public in planning and decision-making processes, the International Association of Public Participation (IAP2) defined public participation as a spectrum or continuum consisting of five levels as defined in Figure 26 including: inform, consult, involve collaborate, and empower [43]. As you move along the spectrum from left (inform) to right (empower), the extent of community members’ participation and influence over planning and decision making processes increases. It should be noted that the different participation levels and their associated goals do not represent a sequence of steps, but rather represent independent goals for community participation that one may wish to achieve [44].
Community empowerment, where community members’ take control over their lives by setting their own agendas, gain skills (or have their own skills and knowledge recognized), increase their self-confidence, solve problems and develop self-reliance, should be the goal of community engagement and development processes whenever feasible [45, 42, 37].
Informing is the only participation goal which is not associated with community engagement and development processes. This is because informing involves only one-way communication, where communities are provided with information. CE and CD processes on the other hand require two-way communication, in which communities give and receive information is required to promote access to information and ensure community meaningful participation [42]. While never a participation goal of CE or CD processes, informing communities may nevertheless be an outcome that can result from such processes e.g. informing a community about emergent animal disease risks, upcoming events or potential opportunities.
The three different approaches for working with communities (CD, CE, SOC) and associated supporting participatory learning and action (PLA) tools and facilitator resources provided within this resource support various community participation goals and provide flexibility for the variety of contexts community-based animal welfare improvement projects may be implemented. Figure 26 illustrates the participation goals on the spectrum of public participation supported by each of the C4A approaches for working with communities.
Figure 26: The spectrum of community participation and its relationship to the three C4A approaches for working with communities [44]
DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION
Diversity and inclusion are two interconnected concepts important to CE and CD processes and their ability to achieve their community participation goals [37, 42]. Diversity is about the composition individuals who may participate in any given process, or rather the representation different groups’ perspectives, knowledge, skills, and lived experiences [46]. Inclusion on the other hand refers to how well these different groups’ contributions, presence and perspectives are valued and integrated [46]. For example, a community engagement or development process where different genders, races, nationalities, and identities are present could be considered diverse, but wouldn’t be considered inclusive if only the perspectives of certain groups are valued or carry any authority or influence. How CD and CE processes are designed and facilitated is thus requires careful attention as this can significantly affect the extent to which such processes ensure diversity and inclusion, or alternatively act to reproduce and/or further reinforce or exacerbate existing inequalities (e.g. in education, access and availability of resources and services, power and influence over decision making etc.) [46, 37, 38, 42].
GENDER
In most societies, being female or male is not simply a matter of being a different sex, which refers to the biological and physical differences between females and males (e.g. bodies, hormones, and organs) [47]. People also face different expectations about how they should behave, what their roles and relations with others in the family, workplace and society should be depending on their sex. These socially and culturally constructed gender norms can result in unequal access and availability of resources and services, decision making power, and ability to influence and participate between the sexes [47, 48]. Similarly, these gender differences can affect men and women’s barriers and motivators to changing behaviour to improve animal welfare [49, 50, 45].
INTERSECTIONALITY
Intersectionality refers to the interconnected nature of social categorizations as they apply to a given individual or group such as race, class, and gender amongst others, which act to create overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage [51]. Intersectionality is therefore not only about the consideration of several social categories, but also about the analysis of their interactions and their implications for different social groups that may contribute to their differential access to resources, opportunities, influence and decision-making power [51]. Using an intersectional lens when conducting any project assessments or analyses is therefore recommended to inform the design, planning, and implementation of CE and CD processes and projects to ensure they do not reinforce inequalities, and effectively support different groups’ equal participation, opportunities, and access to resources for making positive desired changes [38, 37, 42].
Figure 27: Understanding intersectionality through examples of different social characteristics and related types intersecting discrimination people may face as a result.
An example of the implications of intersecting social characteristics for animal welfare is provided below to better bring this concept to life.
A woman from a patriarchal social system in which men hold most of the power while women are excluded from it, is subject to gender norms in which she is expected to take on traditional unpaid care work within her household which includes caring for the household’s livestock.
These gender norms mean that growing up, she was not prioritized to attend school like males in her family and therefore has limited education and skills for gaining paid employment. Her society’s gender roles similarly dictate that men in her household act predominantly as income earners and decision makers within the household, and control household finances. She and her husband are also migrants, and they face discrimination in employment opportunities making it difficult for them to secure higher paying jobs because these are typically awarded to locals. Due to her migratory status, she is also unable to obtain a government issued identity card, which means she is unable to access benefits or opportunities provided by the local government related to the provision of training opportunities and subsidies for livestock improvement. Her inability to access these opportunities limit her options for improving her livestock’s health and productivity, thereby further limiting the amount of income generated to care for her family and livestock. However, even if she could secure a an identity card and access such training opportunities, males in her household would attend as men are prioritized for participation in education opportunities since it believed that women’s socially prescribed gender roles mean they don’t need or benefit from furthering their education. As her family does not earn much money, she is considered to be of lower socio-economic status, and while her care giving role means she has in-depth knowledge of the conditions and needs of her household’s livestock, she is unable access sufficient resources to adequately meet them.
Despite her in-depth knowledge of her animals needs for health treatment, she is also unable to call animal health service providers herself because they don’t respond to her calls because service providers prefer to deal with men because they know they are household decision makers and control household finances and don’t think women are authorized to make such decision or able to pay. When she asks men in the household for resources and services she’s identified are needed to keep the animals healthy and productive, they similarly don’t value her knowledge or livestock caring role since it doesn’t generate income consider her to be uneducated. However, other low income households who are not migrants have identify cards and both men and women can access subsidized animal related resources and health care services.
This example illustrates how gender, socio-economic status, migratory status, and education level all combine to exacerbate the constraints faced in accessing opportunities and resources for improving animals’ welfare. Understanding the intersecting personal attributes and circumstances which contribute to different groups’ inequality and disadvantage is important to designing and implementing projects in ways that promote diversity, inclusion and equality, and address barriers to desired change [51, 37, 42]. Using an intersectional lens may highlight needs for not just mitigating further exacerbation of existing inequalities, but also for addressing them to achieve more equitable benefits and improved outcomes for both people and animals [51].
EQUALITY AND EQUITY
While the terms equality and equity may seem similar, the implementation of one versus the other within CE or CD projects can lead to dramatically different outcomes for marginalized or discriminated individuals or groups [52].
Equality refers to each individual or group of people having the same resources or opportunities, and being treated the same regardless of their differences [52].
Equity is a means for achieving equality by seeking to understand the inequalities that exist, and working to address them so that all groups have what they need to have equal opportunities [52]. The concept recognizes that different groups have different needs and social power and that these differences can make it more challenging for some groups to achieve the same goals with the same effort [52, 46]. As such, it seeks to identify and address these different needs in a manner that rectifies the imbalance between groups. In the development context, an equity goal often requires built-in measures to compensate for the historical and social disadvantages of discriminated and marginalized groups to ensure that all have the exact resources and opportunities they need to reach an equal outcome in accordance with their circumstances [52, 53, 51]. Although this may mean that treatment will be different, it will also be fair.
Equality and equity are important to achieving meaningful and representative community participation in any CE or CD process, as different community members or groups may face different barriers to participation as a result of their identifying attributes, whether socially, economically, demographically or geographically defined [46, 51, 38, 42]. For example, in many societies, social constructs of gender often dictate what the acceptable roles and responsibilities for males and females, with women’s roles often including reproductive/care roles within the household, in addition to productive roles (e.g. paid work) and community roles which are also prescribed to men [47]. As a result, women in such contexts may face increased barriers to participation due to constraints on their available time in light of their gender responsibilities when compared to men, or in contexts where civic participation may be considered to be the role of males in household [47]. For CE or CD processes to promote equality in participation in such circumstances, the unique circumstances of both men and women would first need to be understood, and then strategies developed to enable women to overcome the gendered barriers to participation they may face [51, 37, 42]. In the context of promoting animal welfare for example, promoting gender equality by addressing gender inequities may be important if a context where women play critical roles in their animals’ husbandry and management, but do not have decision making authority or the ability to access resources within their households to improve their animals’ welfare as can male household members.
Equality and equity are also important to understand in terms of behaviour change for improving animal welfare, as marginalized or discriminated groups are likely to face greater barriers to change than non-marginalized members of society (e.g. due to gender, age, race, religion, socio-economic, status, urban vs. rural etc.) . Thus achieving equality in animal welfare improvement outcomes across all sectors of an animal owning community may require specific measures be taken to address the inequities in how marginalized groups’ needs are considered, their contributions valued, and their ability to access opportunities and resources as needed [49, 50].
GENDER MAINSTREAMING
Gender mainstreaming is a globally accepted strategy or process for promoting gender equality. It involves ensuring that gendered analysis, gender perspectives, and attention to the goal of gender equality are central to any planned actions such as project activities, programmes, policies, and legislation so that inequality is not perpetuated [54, 47, 42]. Underlying the concept of mainstreaming gender is a recognition that women and men have different lived experiences and circumstances which affect their needs and access and availability of opportunities. Thus, gender mainstreaming can be a useful strategy for helping understand and address gender disparities and gaps and promote greater equality in such areas as the division of labour between men and women; access to and control over resources, services, information and opportunities; and distribution of power and decision-making [55, 47].
As such, it is not solely about ensuring both men and women participate in a project. For example, gender roles and responsibilities and associated social norms can shape men, women, boys’ and girls’ roles and responsibilities related to their animals, their access and availability of animal related resources and services, and their decision-making power related to their animals, which can either support or hinder their efforts to improve their animals’ welfare [45]. Unless a gender mainstreaming approach is adopted, such disparities may not be fully understood and projects unable to be designed in ways to help overcome them, which may result in less favourable outcomes for both animals and people.
The Gender Integration Continuum illustrated in Figure 28 was originally developed by the Interagency Gender Working Group (IGWG) for promoting equality and helping to mitigate the perpetuation of inequalities between men and women within any project/programme/policy, and can be used as either a diagnostic tool or a planning framework [56].
Gender Integration Continuum as a Diagnostic Tool [56]: As a diagnostic tool, the continuum can be used to assess if and how well gender considerations are integrated within projects/programmes/policies to improve outcomes. In this way, it provides a useful framework for categorizing approaches by how they treat gender norms and inequities in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of projects/programmes/policies.
Gender Integration Continuum as a Planning Framework [56]: As a planning framework, it can help determine how to move along the continuum toward more transformative gender programming. In this context, it is important to emphasize that programmatic interventions should always aim to be “gender aware” at a minimum, and to move towards “transformative gender programming” to the greatest extent feasible.
The gender integration continuum provides a two-tiered process of analysis that begins with determining whether interventions are “gender blind” or “gender aware,” and then considers whether they are exploitative, accommodating or transformative as defined below and illustrated with examples from animal welfare improvement projects in Figure 28 [56]:
Gender Blind [56]: gender blind refers to projects/programmes/policies which are designed without prior analysis of the culturally-defined set of economic, social, and political roles, responsibilities, rights, entitlements, obligations, and power relations associated with being female and male and the dynamics between and among men and women, boys and girls. Gender blind programs/policies ignore gender considerations altogether, and may be unintentionally exploitative or accommodating. They are much less likely to be transformative, as this presumes they would be proactive and intentional in their effort to promote gender equality.
Gender Aware [56]: gender aware refers to policies and programs which deliberately examine and address the set of economic, social, and political roles, responsibilities, rights, entitlements, obligations and power relations associated with being female and male and the dynamics between and among men and women, boys and girls. Gender aware programs/policies examine and address the anticipated gender related outcomes during both the design and implementation of such programmes/policies. Thus an important prerequisite for all gender-integrated interventions is to be gender aware.
Gender Exploitative [56]: refers to projects/programmes/policies which intentionally or unintentionally reinforce or take advantage of gender inequalities and stereotypes in pursuit of desired outcomes. This approach is harmful and can exacerbate inequalities, and undermine the objectives of the program in the long run. Under no circumstances should programs/policies adopt an exploitative approach as one of the fundamental best practices in CE and CD processes is the principle of “do no harm”, a concept further explained the shared core values and principles section below.
Gender Accommodating [56]: Gender accommodating projects/programmes/policies acknowledge but work around gender differences and inequalities to achieve project objectives. Although this approach may result in short term benefits and realization of outcomes, it does not attempt to reduce gender inequality or address the gender and thus may not result in achievement of lasting change.
Gender Transformative [56]: Gender transformative refers to projects/programmes/policies that seek to transform gender roles and relations to promote equality and achieve program objectives. Transformative approaches thus seek to promote greater equity as a means to achieving equality by: 1) Fostering critical examination of inequalities and gender roles, norms and dynamics 2) Recognizing and strengthening positive norms that support equality and an enabling environment, 3) Elevating the relative position of women, girls and marginalized groups as equals to others in society, and 4) Transforming the underlying social structures, policies and broadly held social norms that perpetuate gender inequalities.
Figure 28: Gender Equality Continuum with Examples from Animal Welfare Improvement Projects [56]
As the continuum reflects a spectrum, a particular project may not fall neatly under one type of approach, and may include, for example, both accommodating and transformative elements [56]. The adapted continuum in Figure 28 attempts to illustrate this using the colour red and the dotted line to indicate that while some interventions may be exploitative, or contain elements that are exploitative (intentionally or unintentionally), the aim should always be to move them towards transformative approaches [56]. Integrating gender and striving to move toward more gender transformative programs/policies results in gradually challenging existing gender inequities and positive changes in power relations and/or the set of economic, social and political roles, responsibilities, rights, entitlements and obligations associated with particular gender groups [56, 47]. It is also important to note that the pursuit of transformative programming can always be integrated into ongoing projects without having to start the project over [56].
In the context of animal welfare improvement projects, gender mainstreaming is important ensures the different needs and situations of women, men, boys and girls influencing animals’ welfare are understood. This understanding is helpful to informing the design and implementation of effective CE and CD processes that promote equality in participation, opportunities, and access to resources for all animal owning community members to improve and benefit from improved animal welfare.
However, gender mainstreaming need not be limited to considerations of gender and it is recommended that an intersectional lens be adopted within gender mainstreaming, and any analysis conducted should not only consider gender, but also other relevant intersecting social categorizations that may be exacerbating patterns of inequalities [57, 51, 33]. This will help ensure that any CE or CD approach is designed and implemented in ways which do not reproduce or exacerbate existing inequalities, particularly amongst the most marginalized. In addition, understanding intersectionality in the context of communities with whom you work can help inform development of transformative strategies as needed to better achieve and sustain beneficial outcomes and greater equality for all [46].
The table below provides a summary of general guidance for community facilitators to support working with community members to progress through the different stages of change. It includes definitions of each stage of change with examples in the context of animal welfare, along with the process for community facilitators to focus on when individuals are in each stage, as well as recommended tools and techniques helpful to harnessing people’s own motivations and rationales for change, and building their confidence and commitment to take action and sustain change.
Approaches for Working With Communities: Community Development Approach, Community Engagement Approach, Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach
Behavioural Drivers (COM-B): Motivation
Stages of Change: Stages of Change, Pre-contemplation Stage, Contemplation Stage, Preparation Stage, Action Stage, Maintenance Stage
Project Support: Facilitator Resources, Training
Specific Topics: Outreach and Communication, Community Change Agents
Stage of Change
Processes for Change / What to Focus On
Recommended Tools / Techniques to Use in Each Stage of Change
Pre-contemplation:
Individuals do not recognize the need for change or are not actively considering change.
Consequences/cons of change are felt to outweigh the benefits/positives.
For example, a person doesn’t think it is a problem if they do not provide their animals with access to water to drink throughout the day.
• Build Rapport – show respect and empathy by recognizing individuals’ expertise in their own lives/situations, their intentions for acting informed by their expertise and lived experiences, support their autonomy in decision making rather imposing your expertise.
• Evoke individuals’ reasons for change by connecting behaviour change to the things the individual cares about.
• Elicit change talk/their rationales for change by bringing their attention to their rationales for change and minimize attention and discussion focused on exploring rationales for sustaining their current practices.
• Consciousness Raising: Support individuals to seek out new information to gain understanding and feedback about the problem behaviour to help improve their awareness of the problem (e.g. facts, leaflets). You may wish to consider undertaking a Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach as a first step.
• Dramatic relief: Support individuals experience and express feelings about the problem behaviour and potential solutions, encourage self-evaluative process that enables individuals to assess/understand the negative impacts of the current behaviour and potential benefits of change.
• Environmental Re-evaluation: help raise doubt and increase the person’s perception of the risks and problems with their current behaviour e.g. guided discussions with others, testimonies, storytelling that promote learning and reflection about how their actions affect their animals/themselves/others.
If individuals continue not to recognize or accept there is a problem, focus on continuing to build rapport through active listening, asking open ended questions, using reflections and summaries about what they community and show empathy so they feel understood. Ensure they understand change is ultimately up to them and not being pushed on them. Consider asking to schedule a time when the discussion can be revisited, perhaps after they take time to reflect or seek out additional information.
Recommended Tools/Techniques:
Use OARS to elicit change talk, build rapport, show empathy, and:
• Open ended questions to invite individuals to tell their story in their own words, and provides an opportunity to learn more about what the person cares about e.g. their values and goals.
• Affirmations: Can take the form of compliments or statements of appreciation and understanding that recognize a person’s strengths and acknowledge behaviours / qualities / characteristics that encourage the direction of desired positive change, helps build rapport and their confidence in their ability to change.
• Reflective listening: Involves rephrasing a statement to capture the implicit meaning and feeling of a person’s statement, encourages and helps people understand their motivations more, and helps amplify or reinforce individuals desire for change.
• Summarize what you have heard individuals, highlighting in particular any recognition of the problem, their concerns about the issue, their intent to change, or their optimism about their ability or outcome of making change.
Provide Feedback using Ask – Offer – Ask approach:
• Ask permission to discuss behaviour to show respect, Ask what they already know before offering feedback / advice / information about the issue, Ask permission to offer information they may not know.
• Offer information or feedback if granted to permission to do so.
• Ask them to reflect on the feedback/information you have provided.
Individuals recognize the problem related to their behaviour and are considering change.
They are weighing the pros and cons of change but are ambivalent and/or uncertain, and may feel the negatives of change still outweigh the positives.
For example, a person doesn’t take preventative measures against animal disease despite being concerned about the health risks diseases pose.
• Guide their internal motivation by continuing to elicit change talk / their rationales for change to strengthen their commitment to change.
• Self re-evaluation/Re-evaluating self-image: work to facilitate changing their beliefs and attitudes by (Davis Jr. 2010): - helping them recognise the difference between their values and behaviour/creating cognitive dissonance, - values clarification activities or discussions, - contact and discussions with role models, - guided imagery (where people imagine themselves in the new situation [e.g., animal experiences good welfare and they feel good about practicing desired behaviour]
• Support individuals to choose change through weighing up the pros and cons of change to resolve their ambivalence/tip the balance between the pros and cons by: - exploring ambivalence and alternatives, - identifying reasons for change/risks of not changing, - increasing the persons confidence in their ability to change.
Highlight/promote awareness of success stories/those who have made and sustained similar change to encourage others to follow their example and improve their confidence in their ability to change.
Recommended Tools/Techniques:
Strengthen commitment to change through use of OARS (see above):
• Elicit change talk by asking open-ended questions related to: disadvantages of the status quo advantages of change optimism for change their intention to change.
• Use reflections to amplify or reinforce individuals desire for change.
• Use affirmations to help build individuals confidence in their ability to change.
• Use summaries to point out discrepancies between the person’s current situation and future goals.
Individuals are motivated to change their behaviour/see the benefits of change, and are intent upon taking action.
They believe the positives/benefits of change outweigh the costs, however are considering what to do.
For example, a person is convinced of the benefits of addressing a particular welfare issue, but lack the understanding of what to do about it.
• Goal Setting - support individuals to identify a specific target for change / goal.
• Making a commitment to change.
• Support them to explore options for making the change and select appropriate strategies for taking action e.g. identify time to act, who/what will help.
• Recognize/reiterate individuals’ choice and control over any decisions or change they make.
• Develop a realistic plan for taking action.
• Discuss potential problems/challenges and solutions to help reduce their perceived/real barriers that may make the behaviour more difficult to adopt e.g. how to acquire the necessary knowledge or skills, or ideas for reducing costs.
• Create social conditions to support individuals in making the change as needed (Davis Jr. 2010): - work to change community norms to favour change - draw attention to those who have made a change - organize events or create opportunities for individuals to make their commitment to change publicly or in front of others for greater accountability
Recommended Tools/Techniques:
• Continue elicit change talk to strengthen individuals commitment to change. • Write down individuals goals for change and change plan.
Individuals have initiated change and start practicing the new behaviour, experiencing its benefits as well as costs, such as time, effort, money, opinions of They are taking steps towards change, however haven’t fully stabilized in the process.
For example, a person has begun sheltering their animals at night, however may find that this now requires extra effort to regularly keep it clean.
• Support individuals to implement action plans and take steps toward change based on the plan they developed and revise as needed.
• Work to
• Recognize/reward successes: provide encouragement and feedback on positive steps taken towards desired behaviours, praise and recognize individuals efforts.
• Support individuals to overcome challenges e.g. skill building, assisting with solving problems, identifying and removing/avoiding problem behaviour triggers.
• Consider mechanisms for supporting accountability to help maintain individuals motivation and commitment e.g. self-monitoring, public sharing of achievements/proud moments, give praise and recognition of efforts, facilitate peer-peer support networks.
Recommended Tools/Techniques:
Affirmations can be used to recognize individuals’ strengths and efforts in taking action to change.
Individuals are practicing the new behaviour and making necessary adjustments to sustain the change. The benefits or positives of change are clearly outweigh the costs/negatives. new behaviour is sustained for at least 6 months.
For example, despite efforts to require to learn how to train their animals using positive reinforcement rather than harmful punishments, a person continued guiding their horses without whipping for at least 6 months.
Ensure preconditions for sustainability of change.
Support individuals to develop processes and skills for maintaining change.
Support individuals to identify and use strategies to prevent return to prior behaviour.
Continue to promote individuals’ motivation and confidence in abilities to sustain change through:
• Regular discussions and reflection, and sharing of success stories by those who have made and sustained change, and recognize people’s efforts to change and encourage others to follow their example.
• Continue positive reinforcement and establish mechanisms of rewards and recognition for maintaining behaviours e.g. acknowledge individuals efforts, commitment, and achievements, encourage individuals to be role models for others, public sharing of their successes, continued self-monitoring and reflection on their positive efforts and achievements, as well as benefits of change.
• Encouraged utilization of support systems e.g. peer support networks, linkages with local organizations/extension agents etc.
Establish accountability mechanisms that encourage individuals to sustain change e.g. self-monitoring and sharing of results, peer-peer support and sharing of progress.
Recommended Tools/Techniques:
Affirmations can be used to recognize individuals’ strengths and efforts in maintaining change.
Effective outreach messaging is key to delivering sustainable changes to improve animal welfare. This resource will outline how to develop your messaging strategy; the psychological and societal drivers to consider that will influence the content and design of the messaging; and how to design and deliver messaging in the most effective way to be heard, accepted, and ultimately change behaviour. Follow the steps outlined in the Community Development, Community Engagement, and Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approaches to gather the information you need to generate a greater understanding of your target audience, including barriers that might prevent behaviour change, and what messaging and communication mediums may work best for the specific audience you aim to target.
Stages of Change: Pre-Contemplation Stage, Contemplation Stage
Project Support: Facilitator Resources, Training
Specific Topics: Outreach and Communication,Community Change Agents
ATTENTION!
Communication is a two-way process; it is as important to listen as it is to speak. Listen to feedback given by your target audience, ask for their guidance and then actively listen to their response, and avoid imposing your own ideas without giving full credence to theirs. Your target audience will teach you about their community, so listen and observe carefully.
1.1 Developing your messaging strategy
No community is homogenous, so it is critical to consider the following as you develop ideas (adapted from [32]):
Who do you want to communicate with?
Are there potential supporters or barriers to communication? You need to ascertain who the allies and gatekeepers are to the information you want to communicate i.e. those who may support or regulate the way messaging can be designed and disseminated? You will need to need to anticipate reactions when developing/framing the messages so ensure you work with these allies and gatekeepers to facilitate the effectiveness of the communication.
Do you need to tailor messages for different target audiences? Are you trying to change the behaviour of animal owners, or perhaps people who offer resource provision for animal owners, or those at a higher level of leadership within a community?
Why should your message matter to your audience?
What are the differences within your target audience you need to consider, such as values, social norms, beliefs, religions, traditions, power dynamics and varied experiences because of intersecting issues in their lives?
Does everyone in your target audience have a similar capacity and motivation for change? For example, are there differences in literacy levels, knowledge, and access to resources or wide socio-economic divides? Does everyone have the same need or want to change?
What is the main overarching narrative any messaging needs to convey?
What are your communication goals? Key messages need to support these goals. Try to keep specific goals to only one or two; distribution of resources over too many goals will dilute messaging and reduce the likelihood of behaviour change.
What are your messaging needs - are they needed to support a long term or short-term subject?
How does your messaging create a sustainable vision for the future – do you know what that might look like?
How widely do you want to disseminate information? (this may also depend on your organisation’s targets, which will influence how accessible it needs to be to a wider audience) A small, more personalised approach can be more effective but is more resource heavy, than a larger scale approach, which is less resource intensive, reaches a greater audience but may cause less degree of change [88].
How do the audience share information between themselves, and how do they most readily receive information?
Your message is the core information you wish to communicate, through whichever media you have decided will be most effective within your target audience (refer to Societal and Campaigns Approach for more information about types of communication media). Your messaging needs to persuade people that they need to change, though of course behaviour change is not as simple as telling someone they need to change. People need to be supported and given opportunities to explore the problems and generate ideas for possible solutions - giving them ownership of the changes they need to create ( [89]). Bear in mind you will never attain 100% uptake of any behaviour change target, people are individuals with differing priorities and pressures.
1.2 Psychological and societal drivers your messaging strategy needs to consider
Behaviour is incredibly complex so effective messaging to create sustainable behaviour change needs to consider how all the following drivers’ interplay and influence each other, for example, knowledge can influence attitudes but then changing attitudes can lead to a person seeking out more knowledge; internal and external drivers can be interdependent [90]. Also refer to the facilitator resource 2. Essential communication skills for promoting behaviour change.
1.2.1 Internal and External Drivers
Internal and external drivers must be considered when designing messaging for human behaviour change. The following section outlines different internal and external drivers influencing people’s behaviours.
Social norms are the informal rules and understandings everyone abides by [91] and are an important driver in behaviour change; what people see others doing may be more likely to encourage them to adopt the behaviour [90]. However, social norms can also create barriers to positive behaviours by the persistence of negative behaviours that are perceived as acceptable within that community [91]. Social norms as drivers of behaviour make perfect sense; if we see others performing a behaviour, we can see that it works, and we can also observe the method. People are drawn towards those who behave the same way and avoid those who deviate (generally!). Using messaging that harnesses social and descriptive norms may increase the effectiveness of the information you are trying to convey, particularly when the information is included as part of guided group discussion [90]. For example, highlighting how a target behaviour has benefitted or been adopted by a proportion of people already within their community, is more likely to influence uptake, than communicating about social responsibility towards animal welfare improvement. Be careful when developing messaging, as highlighting the frequency people engage in undesirable behaviours can also increase the likelihood of other people adopting these behaviours for the same reasons as previously mentioned. People are highly social, so if they believe an undesirable behaviour is common within their community your message could have the opposite impact to the one you are expecting [90, 89].
Introducing this concept in your messaging is important to overcome barriers such as those mentioned previously, in the maintenance of negative behaviours due to social norms. Introducing shared values, a value-based approach, or thinking about the values needed to grow within the community to move towards positive behaviour change, can create useful dialogue about the similarities we share with the audience and enables diverging behaviour to be reframed within a more acceptable vision [91]. Values determine a person’s willingness to change, their openness to new information and their concern for ‘others’. Although changing people’s values is incredibly difficult, targeting these values when developing messaging can be a very effective method to encourage behaviour change [90].
Attitudes are strong predictors of behaviour when “based on personal experience, specific to the behaviour, and salient”. The most effective messaging considers the credibility of its source (your key influencers), the format your messaging takes and its content. Make messaging applicable and salient for your target audience, something the audience can believe is replicable and beneficial to them in their current environment [90].
In addition, an individual’s beliefs will influence their interpretation and processing of messaging; beliefs are an individual’s assertion that something exists or is true developed from their direct personal exposure to information. People are more likely to accept messaging that is framed in a way that is consistent with their beliefs; if messaging does not challenge their world view, they are less likely to reject it. When people are exposed to messaging that is inconsistent with their beliefs, they are likely to show resistance to the new information and more firmly fix onto their original view; this also has implications when developing messaging as people will most strongly believe the first messaging that is delivered so ensuring it is accurate is essential. Be aware of your own beliefs when developing messaging, incorrect assumptions may cause offence and alienate your audience.
Personal norms will play a part in how willing someone is to take responsibility and change their behaviour. It is difficult to increase someone’s sense of personal responsibility but asking for a level of commitment through your communications can increase the likelihood a person will try to act. This is even more effective when people verbalise or write their commitments publicly rather than in private, but these commitments should always be a voluntary action [90]. When an agreed commitment is written and displayed publicly within a community, those who have joined in with the agreement will have a greater feeling that the behaviour change is being internally driven by their own choices. For behaviour change to be truly sustainable, a person needs to be able to attribute that change to themselves, rather than some external forces. However, there will be differences on how much value is placed on individuals expressing their own individual behaviour, depending on whether communities have interdependent or independent cultures [90].
Emotions are a useful route to encourage sustainable behaviour [90]. Increasing empathy, such as encouraging your target audience to ‘imagine how an animal feels’ or by appreciating some elements of shared experiences with their animals, may promote willingness to try methods of husbandry that are known to be more humane.
Self efficacy or a person’s belief in their ability to perform an action, increases motivation to perform a behaviour [90]. Some members of your target audience, such as those more marginalised or discriminated against, may have less confidence in their ability to create change or make a difference [92, 93]. Using messaging that increases knowledge about the behavioural options available to improve animal welfare, particularly when broken down into smaller manageable steps with regular positive feedback, can support peoples’ perceptions of their ability to change their practices [90]. Messaging may need to be developed that helps support the challenging or broadening of perceptions within the wider public e.g. promoting women as key decision makers in seeking services when this is not typical within their community or how an individual woman perceives themselves.
Encouraging the collaboration of groups of individuals, either as formed memberships or peer to peer, can increase the effectiveness of messaging. Groups of individuals working together may provide a link between individual action attempts and a wider societal reach; working together provides social support and encourages sustaining behaviour change to form habitual patterns. Social capital or the shared bonds, reciprocity and trust encouraged by working together increases obligations and cooperation and is a useful concept to embrace. However, it will not work in isolation if a community does not have the capacity for change (such as a lack of resources, knowledge, power and so on) but embedding messages within social groups is known to increase their effectiveness. Ensuring messaging and communications are participatory in their development increases the chances the behaviour change will be adopted by heightening the sense of group or social identity and empowerment within the target audience [90].
Correct framing will influence how well received and understood your messaging is, and ultimately influence whether people are likely to change their behaviour and/ or attitudes. Incorrectly framed messages may move people into cognitive dissonance and denial, creating a barrier towards any further change [94]; but harnessing dissonance may also motivate behaviour change in a direction more consistent with a person’s attitudes and as the behaviour changes the attitude may change to be more consistent with the behaviour [90].
1.3 How to design and deliver effective messages
Messaging as a journey (adapted from [124])
To provide a good, solid foundation, messaging needs to capture attention and be relevant to your audience:
Where possible, use media or communications that utilise all the senses – people learn and remember in different ways so try to capture the imagination of as many of your audience as possible. Embed messages within the physical environment your target audience frequent and the media sources they tend to utilise [125].
Applicable
Applicable: to real life - tangible, believable, achievable
Make the idea you are trying to convey tangible to that audience – if a concept is tricky to understand make it clearer by relating it to something where they do have experience.
Personalised
Personalised: to your target audience – beliefs, social norms, attitudes etc.,
Use images as close to the target audiences’ experience as possible – it needs to be believable, and people need to feel they too could achieve what is being shown. Use local landmarks, recognisable clothing, types of building, and so on.
(Adapted from [32])
1.3.1 Development of messaging
An effective communication strategy must include well-conceived content, but the delivery, dissemination and execution of the information is key to drawing the audience in whilst also motivating and empowering them to change [97].
Keep messaging simple, avoid jargon or the use of unfamiliar terminology as this will turn a receptive audience into an ambivalent one very quickly.
Use audience guidance to develop messages
Target audiences may adhere to very different values and behaviours in terms of communication styles. Develop relationships and be creative, respect, listen and respond to these differences. It is important to generate messaging that is meaningful to your audience and allow them to be instrumental in supporting that process of change. Prescriptive communications and provision of solutions can create reliance and disempower your audience, and this process can encourage psychological reactance, which creates barriers to change [91, 98]. See Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach for the practical ways to encourage target audience discussion.
Frame your message
Evaluation of ways that make the behaviour easy or difficult, and whether solutions are simple or require more involved interventions, all impact how messaging is framed and how it will be received. People cannot change their behaviour if the resource required to support that change is not available within their environment or is inaccessible due to its cost or complexity of use [90]. Most messages highlight positive outcomes but sometimes highlighting the losses that may be incurred if a behaviour change is not adopted can be more effective. Emphasising the local and immediate impacts of the issue can encourage your audience to relate to the issue and increase effectiveness of communications [32, 97].
Debunking
Correcting misinformation or myths can backfire, so it is recommended to avoid using this technique in your messaging. Mentioning misinformation can serve to increase familiarity and reinforce the maintenance or adoption of negative undesirable behaviours. If you have no option and this technique must be used, any misinformation debunking should always follow clear evidence containing the correct information [97].
Make messaging specific
Describe actions clearly, in easy steps to improve clarity and comprehension and increase a person’s self-efficacy (see section 1.2.1).
Avoid fear based, threatening or authoritarian/ prescriptive messaging
People react to these types of messages with either problem-focused coping or emotion-focused coping, and responses are heavily reliant on the degree of self-efficacy (see section 1.2.1) and the control people have of their situation. Reactions are likely to lead to avoidance, particularly when dealing with marginalised communities, so this method of messaging should be avoided [32].
Encourage commitment
By getting people to sign up to the project, perhaps those who have signed up or pledged to work at targeted changes get some visible marker that they have joined – such as a badge or other signal that increases the chance of them sticking to the project (people do not like to be inconsistent), which can then encourage peers to want to sign up. Refer to personal norms and social norms in section 1.2.1. for more information. Public commitment to change tends to be effective at sustained behaviour change by transferring motivation from an external source (pleasing others) to an internal one (self-fulfilment) [90, 89].
Provide goals
Encouraging the target audience either individually or together to work towards certain target behaviours can increase the perception of social norms (see section 1.2.1.) and encourage peer-to peer pressure to engage in them.
Make messages memorable
Develop specific prompts to help people remember the behaviour changes when you are clear which behaviour you are targeting, these prompts can also be linked to parts of an established routine to increase the chances of habit formation [91]. If there are barriers to people adopting some behaviours, for instance being unsure about how to treat certain wounds, you could create a card that your audience can use that takes them through the steps (either visually or written depending on literacy) or create a vivid reminder to water their animals that they can attach to somewhere prominent [32, 89].
1.3.2 Delivery of messages
Use a credible source
Pick your spokesperson/s carefully; trust and rapport is an important element of behaviour change [97]. To disseminate some of your messaging you may want to use existing social networks and so enlisting people considered influential within their community is key – refer to Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach for guidance on how to identify these key influencers. Do not immediately assume the key influencers to be the official leaders within a community. Do your research; key influencers are those who the target audience look up to as valuable sources of credible information and are also those who encounter the greatest number of people [90]. Avoid the use of groups or channels that could increase social divisions, such as strongly political or those from a very different socio-economic background [90].
Avoid solely providing information
This is known to be less effective at promoting behaviour change, although knowledge does matter. Giving people information to enable them to understand their behavioural options and the impact of these options on welfare is important, particularly at low levels of knowledge [90].
Narratives
The use of narratives with compelling storylines and characters that relate to the target audiences’ beliefs and values can emotionally engage audiences and motivate change with greater effectiveness than arguments and information [97].
Behaviour change is dynamic
Not all information will be relevant or most effective at the same time or in the same way [96] – adapt your messaging, accordingly, listen to feedback and for change talk, different messaging will work effectively depending on the Stage of Change of your target audience.
Showcase
Use early adopters of the targeted behaviour change to showcase the benefits in your messaging. Showcasing examples from early adopters serves two purposes, it not only shows the target audience that behaviour change is achievable, which creates social norms and overcomes barriers, but also it increases the commitment the adopter has and in doing so increases the chance the behaviour change will be sustained [89]. These early adopters could also assist by disseminating messaging; encouraging peer to peer or community contact is a major influence on adoption of behaviour changes via social diffusion [32].
Feedback
Effective messaging involves receiving feedback from your target audience, which can help guide and adapt your messaging to make it more effective, but you also have a responsibility to feedback to your target audience. Where target behaviours have been adopted feeding back to your community about, for instance, how many people have reduced the wounds in their animals, or have adopted free access to water provision, can serve to increase the likelihood of the behaviour change being sustained in the longer term.
This checklist reflects the key skills and observable behaviours for effectively facilitating community participation and empowerment. While these skills may not all be observed or needed for all activities or contexts in which communities’ are engaged, they represent the core competencies desirable in community facilitators. By harnessing these skills, community facilitators can enable community participants to freely express their opinions, ideas, and concerns, feel valued and respected, and help foster their sense of self-efficacy and ownership over change. This resource can be used as a self or peer assessment tool to help identify capacity strengthening needs and areas of improvement, inform training delivery, and support effective delivery of community development or engagement projects.
Approaches for Working With Communities: Community Development Approach, Community Engagement Approach
Project Support: Facilitator Resources, Training
Community Facilitation Skills Checklist
Did the facilitator come prepared to ensure activity/discussion ran smoothly and didn’t waste unnecessary time of participants? e.g. appropriate materials, understanding of the activity
Did the facilitator sit/position themselves same level with participants?
Did the facilitator explain the purpose of the discussion/activity before it started, and give an indication of how long it would last?
Did the facilitator ask if participants had any questions before the session/exercise began?
Did the facilitator their unsolicited opinions/information/answers rather than facilitate participants to discuss, reflect, learn, and identify their own ideas?
Did the facilitator use open ended questions to help participants reflect and identify key learnings for themselves?
Did the facilitator prevent domination of the activity/discussion by one or a few people, and encourage participation/input from others?
Did the facilitator encourage equal participation from men and women and/or people who are marginalized or vulnerable?
Did the facilitator encourage even shy/timid participants to speak/participate?
Did the facilitator summarize the discussion and key learnings at the end?
Did the facilitator ask participants for feedback on their experience of the discussion/activity at the end? This is important to understand the perspective of participants and whether they felt time spent was valuable to them, to enable them to make any improvements in the future.
Did the facilitator make plans for follow up with the participants and/or ensure clear understanding of next steps?
Did the facilitator record the outcome/result of the activity to ensure the community has a copy, and relevant information could be used to inform project planning?
Was the facilitator engaging and respectful from the beginning to end of the visit?
For effective facilitation, the community facilitator must process the following skills: -
Actively listen: Listening is the bedrock of good facilitation skills. Effective listening before and during a session/meeting is necessary to create a tailored and relevant learning process.
Ask questions: Ask questions often during the session/meeting. This is a critical facilitation skill to move individual and group sharing and learning forward. Questions can be framed to accomplish different types of responses, such as to gain or focus attention, solicit information, give information, direct the thoughts of others, and close discussions.
Be comfortable with silence: Often, questions are met with silence. Participants may need time to process the question, formulate a response, or think of other questions. However, silence can also mean that participants are confused or frustrated. With more experience, you can read nonverbal cues and know how best to address silence.
Be flexible: You never know exactly how a session/meeting will go, who will be there, and what unexpected events will arise. Be flexible and willing to shorten an activity, add important language to a definition, or adapt an exercise.
Stay focused on objectives: Select just one or two practices to focus on during a session/meeting, so that you can discuss them in more detail. If participant discussions get off-topic, refocus the group by using phrases such as “this is interesting to explore further at another time, but let’s return to the topic.” It is your responsibility to find the appropriate time to intervene, thank participants, and bring the conversation back to the objective.
Use verbal and nonverbal encouragement: By using verbal and nonverbal cues, you can make participants feel more comfortable with sharing their thoughts and ideas. By nodding your head or agreeing with the participants as they are speaking, they will feel encouraged to continue sharing. It is also helpful to foster participation of shy or modest participants.
Foster respect among participants: Mutual respect and trust between you and the participants and among the participants nurtures the learning process. Effective learning is supported through the constructive and supportive feedback of respected peers.
Use participatory activities: When participants actively engage with others, they build capacities that are more effective, memorable, and easy to apply. Mix activity types so that there are opportunities to work alone, in small groups, and in one large group. Everyone in the room is a student and a facilitator.
Build in time for reflection: The most effective learning takes place through “real world” experiences, including the opportunity to reflect, identify patterns, draw conclusions, and derive principles that will apply to similar experiences in the future. Allow time for participants to share their experiences and/or to respectfully share others’ experiences.
Build in time for forward planning: Participants need time to practice their new skills, but also to consider ways in which to change their practices going forward. When talking about behaviour change, always include time to discuss barriers and enablers.
Seek feedback: This will ensure that participants can freely express how they found the process, and what needs to be improved. A sample feedback form that can be adapted is presented below.
In addition to the key concepts and shared core values and principles underpinning best practices in community engagement and development already outlined, the following additional recommendations are provided based on lessons learned within the field of community engagement and development, and community-based animal welfare improvement projects. It is recommended that these be used to inform the design and implementation of any CE and CD process to mitigate common pitfalls which can undermine the effectiveness of these processes and related achievement of animal welfare improvement goals.
Be Empathetic and Compassionate
Empathy involves viewing things other’s perspective and being understanding of their experiences and feelings, with your primary feelings more related to the other person’s situation than your own experience of it [58]. It makes people feel heard and understood which makes people more likely to make change, as well as helps in building connection and rapport [58]. Compassion refers to the desire to help/support, which can build on empathy by taking into consideration the understanding of others’ experiences and feelings and tailoring the desire to support in accordance with what the other person expresses they need. Being empathetic may not always be easy when people are engaging in behaviours that are causing harm to animals, however your relationship with community members and ability to support them in making desired changes can be improved by engaging in the following ways:
Feel and express/reflect genuine care and concern: be empathetic to people’s circumstance and feelings by communicating your own understanding of what they’re feeling and experiencing (e.g. it’s a challenging time for you and you’re not alone, I understand you’ve experienced a lot and it’s not been easy for you), as opposed to expressing sympathy which expresses understanding from your own perspective (e.g. expressing pity) [58].
Be non-judgemental: if you notice yourself judging someone, remember that people have their own good reasons for feeling and acting in the ways they do, and that their behaviours are the result of their capability, motivation and opportunities [20, 21, 58]. Focus on understanding their rationale and situation, rather than judging their results.
Your role is to motivate and facilitate people in changing their behaviours, however it is community members who ultimately decide whether they will take action to change, and it is essential to respect their autonomy to do so [20, 58].
Understand Who to Engage
When deciding whose participation to target and how, it is important to identify whose animals are most vulnerable to poor welfare, and which individuals’ can affect change in the welfare status of animals [20, 21]. Individuals’ related ability to influence their animals’ welfare are likely to be influenced by their social identities and associated roles and responsibilities [50]. However, in identifying who to engage and whose behaviour to target for change, it is important to ensure the project is not operating in a gender blind or exploitative way or legitimizing or exacerbating biases, discrimination and inequalities experienced by marginalized groups [33, 37, 42]. Adoption of strategies to address inequitable distribution of roles, responsibilities, decision making power, and influence may therefore need to be considered to achieve optimal outcomes for animal welfare, as well as greater equality and equity in opportunities and access to resources important to supporting animals’ welfare [50, 49].
Avoid a One Size Fits All Approach
Evidence suggests a one size fits all approach does not suit all, and that organising approaches that combine methods of engagement are likely to be more effective in promoting inclusivity and diversity and better support achievement of desired outcomes [46]. In addition, seek to understand the intersecting issues which may constrain different community members’ participation, and capabilities, motivation and opportunities to positively contribute to their animals’ welfare, as these are likely to vary widely depending on individuals and groups’ attributes and personal circumstances [21]. The local context and project resources must also be taken into consideration when determining the most appropriate and feasible approaches for working with communities to change behaviours to improve animal welfare.
Focus on Community Identified Priorities
Supporting priorities identified by the community helps promote community participation and ownership over desired outcomes, and ensures outcomes are relevant and meaningful to communities [61, 37, 59, 42]. Use participatory approaches to support bottom up identification of community’s priority needs or issues of concern to work on [37, 38, 42]. If a project has priority issues or outcomes it is interested in supporting, ensure that the project agenda is similarly prioritized by communities. If your agenda is not well aligned with that of the community, you may wish to reconsider whether it is ethical and necessary to proceed in working with communities to achieve it, or alternatively you may need to do some additional ground work to generate greater understanding and unlock their interest and motivation to adopt your priority agenda items as their own.
Ensure Community Facilitators Have Appropriate Core Competencies
Working with communities to facilitate behaviour change required specialized skills, and effective facilitation can make the difference between productive and non-productive CE and CD processes, and significantly influence community participation as well as the success of animal welfare intervention projects [46, 38, 42]. Engagement with communities can often go awry due to bad facilitation, poor communication skills, poorly managed confrontational dynamics, shallow exchanges, and the invisible barriers erected by perceived expertise [46]. In addition, CE and CD processes can reproduce existing inequalities unless they are designed and facilitated to distribute influence by ensuring diversity and inclusion [46, 50, 37]. It is therefore recommended community facilitators and community change agents have sufficient core competencies to undertake their roles and responsibilities in an ethical, effective, and participatory manor, and are provided necessary training and support to undertake their responsibilities as needed [50, 38, 42].
Build Networks and Structures of Support
Build Networks and Structures of Support: Individuals can only adopt and sustain desired changes when they have an enabling environment to do so [41, 21]. It can be helpful to facilitate social networks amongst target peer groups, and encourage them to provide support and encouragement to each other where they have shared interests in achieving positive change [65, 63]. Building opportunities for enhanced peer support and positive role modelling can also increase the willingness of others to try the new behaviours, as well as further motivate them to sustain it [66, 31, 63]. Similarly, it may be necessary to support creating or strengthening enabling systems or structures to ensure they can fulfil their duties and meet the needs of communities and their animals [20, 21, 38, 42]. In concert, linking communities with key actors within these systems and generating understanding and relationships between different these different stakeholders can be helpful to improving the delivery of resources and services necessary to supporting animal welfare [20]. For example, ensuring animal health service providers have relevant knowledge, skills, and resources available to provide quality and affordable animal health services to communities, and organizing meetings to introduce key actors to communities and generate demand for services has proven an effective strategy for supporting communities’ service seeking behaviour within Brooke’s animal welfare programmes [67]. In addition, by strengthening the social networks within animal owning communities, communities within Brooke project areas in India have been able to coordinate their collective seeking of preventative animal vaccines and bulk purchases of quality animal feed, thereby reducing costs for community members and increasing animal service and resource providers’ responsiveness to these communities’ needs.
Promote Sustainability [59]
Promoting sustainability refers to ensuring that project outcomes and desired positive changes can be maintained beyond the timescale of the project. Achieving lasting change is supported by ensuring communities have the capacity, opportunity and motivation to independently sustain animal welfare improvements upon withdrawal of support and project exit [21, 20]. By understanding the drivers of behaviour and barriers to change from the perspective of those who are targeted to adopt such changes, and empowering communities to overcome them themselves, lasting change is more likely to be achieved [21, 20, 67]. It is therefore important that interventions implemented do not promote community members’ dependency on external support in order to for them to sustain desired positive change. Focusing on solutions which harness and strengthen local knowledge, skills, and resources is more likely to lead to lasting change [20, 38, 37, 41, 42, 61]. For example, after years of providing free animal health clinics, The Brooke observed this strategy had unintended consequences of undermining existing animal health service providers’ delivery of services, and decreased people’s willingness to invest in these services themselves. As a result, there was poor maintenance of service seeking behaviours when free animal health services were no longer provided upon project exit. In addition, promoting community ownership over issues, solutions and outcomes improves the sustainability of change, as does relying on local knowledge, skills, and strengths to the greatest extent feasible [61, 42].
Embed Opportunities for Learning and Reflection
Experiential learning that involves opportunities for reflective evaluation of not only what has and has not been achieved, but also how these outcomes resulted support learning, generate motivation to take action or sustain change, and foster a greater sense of ownership over results [41, 65]. Participatory learning and action methods and tools can be particularly useful to generating discussions that promote learning and reflection, and can be helpful to supporting people’s progress through the stages of change [68, 42, 67]. In addition, providing opportunities for participants to demonstrate their acquired understanding or skills, and feedback on their learning experience can help further embed learnings and enable adaptation of communications and trainings as needed [42]. Using a variety of verbal, visual and practical hands-on learning exercises is also recommended to accommodate the variety of ways people learn, incorporating as much experiential learning as possible. Delivering learnings through one-way communication, in which information is shared without feedback or discussion with participants, is least effective and should always be avoided [42].
Evoke Peoples Own Reasons For Change
Telling people what the problem is and what they need to do is the least effective way to support them in making desired changes. Instead of telling individuals what to do, seek to invoke community members’ own motivation and resources for change.
Trust that individuals are motivated for something, even if it is not what you want them to do.
Avoid acting as the expert and advising on what others should be doing. It’s natural to want to help fix problems for people, however this doesn’t help them own the process or results.
Respect community members as experts in their own lives. Seek to understand their experiences and rationales for current behaviours, evoke their own reasons for change, and support them in identifying their own solutions.
Only provide your expertise as needed to mitigate potential unintended consequences of their solutions on animals, people, or the environment, and ask before offering ideas or advice when they are unable to solution issues themselves.
Ensure the Safety and Security of Project Stakeholders
Ensure the Safety and Security of Project Stakeholders: Put safeguarding policies and standard operating procedures in place to mitigate potential harm to stakeholders that may result from engaging in animal welfare improvement projects. Ensure such projects create a safe and secure enabling environment for potentially discriminated and vulnerable groups to participate, as well as for project workers to implement their roles and responsibilities without putting themselves, animals, the environment or others at risk [42].
Generate discussion and awareness amongst community members about their animals’ welfare needs and the animal husbandry and management practices that can meet them (refer to Part 1 below).
Support the identification of behaviours that are feasible for communities to adopt to improve their animals' welfare (refer to Part 2 below).
Identify actions communities can take to improve their animals welfare even when they are unable to address identified welfare issues due to barriers they/the project faces in resolving these issues’ root causes (refer to Part 3 below).
This resource demonstrates how the five domains of animal welfare framework can be linked with human behaviours using donkeys as an example. It illustrates its use as a discussion tool in promoting understanding of donkey’s welfare needs, and for identifying behaviours feasible for community members to adopt to improve their donkeys’ welfare. Refer to this illustrative example to support your development of a five domains framework linked with human behaviours that is relevant to the context of your work. The Animals and Communities Learning Module is also a recommended foundational reading for understanding animal welfare and the five domains of animal welfare discussed in this resource.
PART 1: Developing a Five Domains of Welfare Linked to Human Behaviours Discussion Tool
Table 9a provides an illustrative example of a five domains of welfare framework for donkeys, linked with identified potential human behaviours for meeting donkeys’ welfare needs. It is recommended to populate the five domains framework with animal welfare experts knowledgeable in the target species, and then brainstorm a list of human behaviours in consultation with representative members of the animal owning community to ensure they reflect locally appropriate and acceptable behaviours. In addition, animal welfare experts must work hand in hand with community development/engagement teams for these discussions to ensure any potential behaviours identified for meeting animals’ welfare needs support positive life experiences and do not adversely cause harm to animals. Developing a species specific five domains framework linked to the potential human behaviours for meeting an animals’ welfare needs within the domains of nutrition, health, environment and behaviour can support community discussions and awareness raising about animals’ welfare needs and the animal husbandry and management practices recommended to meet them.
Donkey Welfare Needs Associated with Domains of Welfare
Human Behaviours Associated with Meeting Donkey’s Welfare Needs (Ideal Best Practices Appropriate within Local Context)
NUTRITION DOMAIN
a.Food Quantity and Quality · Donkey’s nutritional requirements are met by eating a sufficient quantity and variety of nutritional feeds (e.g. fibre based feeds) for taste and pleasure. · Donkeys feed on small potions and very often. This is essential for health. In a natural situation donkeys eat for 12-16 hours a day to maintain health. With work they likely need additional energy (e.g. feed during rest breaks during work). b.Water Quantity and Quality: · Donkeys have access to and drink sufficient quantity of water while working and at home
a.Human Behaviours Related to Food Quantity and Quality · Provide sufficient quantities of predominantly fibre based feeds (grass/hay) and other suitable locally available forages including straw (e.g. from oat, barley, wheat), and/or soya meal as local availability permits based on recommended proportions for their animals’ size and workload, at intervals throughout their working day (every 3 hours or /2-3 times/day). · Provide donkeys with opportunities to graze on natural forage when they are not working as often as possible when locally available and provide forage (e.g. straw/hay) when they are not working if there is no or limited natural vegetation available to graze. b.Human Behaviours Related to Water Quantity and Quality · Provide freely available clean water to donkeys whenever they are at home not working. · Provide clean water to donkeys throughout their working day (every 3 hours or /2-3 times/day). · Provide more clean water during hot seasons/conditions and adjust working hours to avoid strong heat time
HEALTH DOMAIN
a.Absence of Disease b.Absence of Lameness c.Absence of Preventable Injuries e.g. wounds d.Provide Timely Treatment and Pain Management
a.Human Behaviours Promoting Absence of Disease · Seek yearly health checks from qualified animal health service providers. · Check donkey’s general health and well-being on daily basis. · Take preventative measures against preventable diseases at recommended treatment intervals (e.g. yearly vaccines, parasite control). · Clean manure from donkey resting areas at home on a daily basis to mitigate parasitic diseases spread by flies, and hoof health issues. b.Human Behaviours Promoting Absence of Lameness · Load donkey carts in a balanced way within the reasonable maximum load to prevent lameness · Pick/clean donkey’s hooves daily before and after working to maintain hoof health and comfort during working. · Seek qualified farriery service providers to trim donkey’s hooves at the regularly recommended frequency to promote hoof health and mitigate lameness. · Clean donkey resting areas on a daily basis to ensure substrate is clean and doesn’t accumulate pools of water/urine to mitigate hoof health issues. · Allow the donkey to go more slowly and choose their route if the ground surface is uneven. If an alternative less uneven route is available, select this route. · Allow the donkey to go more slowly and choose their route if the ground surface is uneven. If an alternative less uneven route is available, select this route. c.Human Behaviours Promoting Absence of Preventable Injuries e.g. wounds · Clean equipment which comes into direct contact with donkey’s skin to remove accumulation of dust and prevent painful rubbing and wounds (e.g. pads and harnesses). · Load donkey carts in a balanced way to prevent equipment rubbing from causing wounds. · Use body and verbal communication to guide donkeys instead of whipping to prevent wounds and stress. · Groom animals to remove dust from skin before they work to prevent equipment rubbing and causing wounds. · Use properly fitting, quality equipment purchased from welfare friendly equipment suppliers (e.g. cart, harness, bit makers), and/or made from locally available materials in accordance with recommendations for promoting welfare (e.g. padding made with straw). · Clean donkey’s eyes daily to remove discharge and debris and check for abnormalities to help mitigate eye problems. · Load donkeys with no more than the recommended weight appropriate for the animals’ size to prevent injury. d.Human Behaviours Promoting Timely Treatment and Pain Management · Clean any skin wounds in accordance with recommended guidance as soon as wounds are observed. · Provide rest for donkey to recover from the injury or until wound recovers · Seek timely treatment from qualified animal health service providers when animal is sick or injured. · Donkeys pain and suffering is managed as needed when injuries or illnesses occur through administration of pain medications prescribed and administered as needed by a qualified animal health service professional
ENVIRONMENT DOMAIN
a.Thermal Comfort/Weather Protection · Prevention of adverse physiological reactions from sun/heat and adverse weather conditions b.Safe Environment · Environment where donkey lives/works is safe and does not pose a risk of injury/harm e.g. traffic, edible rubbish, sharp objects, pooling water where animal stands etc. · Environment permits escape/safety from predation c.Space for Exhibiting Natural Behaviours · Sufficient available space for donkeys to freely socialize with others within shelter or outside the shelter, and also to allow them to move away from other animals as needed e.g. to avoid conflict · Donkeys have space to roam and carry out normal grazing/foraging behaviours without competition · Donkeys have space to roll in the dirt and scratch when not working. d.Substrate/Floor Comfort · Substrate where animals rest and stand is free from excrement and/or pooling water
a.Human Behaviours Related to Thermal Comfort/Weather Protection · Provide donkeys with shelter during hot and wet/rainy weather. · Rest donkeys in shade or shelter with appropriate ventilation while on breaks during working hours to protect them from the heat of the sun and other adverse weather conditions. · Provide shelter large enough to accommodate all animals made of locally available and appropriate materials to remain at optimal temperatures that protect their animals from the heat and other adverse weather conditions (e.g. physical building, wall or other man made or natural structure that is appropriately ventilated.) b.Human Behaviours Promoting a Safe Environment for Donkeys · Remove harmful items/hazards from locations where donkeys are left to rest, graze, and in their shelter areas (e.g. edible plastics, sharp objects etc.) to prevent risk of harm. · Use shelter materials which are safe and do not pose a risk to donkey’s safety · When allowing donkeys to freely graze iv. Keep an eye on their movements and ensure they do not wander to rubbish heaps and ingest plastics and/or v. Tether donkeys using recommended welfare promoting methods and equipment to ensure their safety and prevent their ingestion of harmful materials, and change their location frequently so as not to limit the quantity of feed they are able to graze. · Keep to sides of roads to mitigate potential traffic collisions while transporting goods/people. · Equip donkey carts with reflectors to ensure they are visible to traffic while working. · Equip donkey carts with breaking systems to help manoeuvre effectively in traffic while working. · Ensure donkeys are safe from potential theft, predation and road traffic at night by keeping them in their shelters or other designated safe space close to home where they can be heard if distressed. · Ensure donkeys are safe from road traffic accidents at night by using carts with reflectors. c.Human Behaviours Promoting Space for Donkeys to Exhibit Natural Behaviours · Provide daily opportunities for donkeys to freely roam/carry out normal grazing/foraging behaviours without competition whenever safe to do so. · Allocate adequate space as available and daily opportunities while donkeys are not working to: 1) to freely move their limbs in a natural state, 2) rest, access feed, and avoid excrement, 3) socialize with other donkeys if present/feasible, and 4) move away from other animals as needed for their safety/mitigate conflict/competition and/or predation, 5) Roll and scratch without hindrance of equipment. d.Human Behaviours Promoting Substrate/Floor Comfort · Clean donkey shelters/rest area’s at home daily of excrement and any and excess pooling water · Provide deep, soft substrate for comfort and effective rest/sleep.
BEHAVIOUR DOMAIN
a.Ability/agency to interact with other animals · Donkeys can choose to interact and socialize with other donkeys or other species animals (e.g. touch/mutual grooming, play) or remove themselves from the presence of others. b.Ability/agency to Interact with Environment/Exhibit Natural Behaviours · Donkeys carry out normal behaviours such as rolling, lying down/resting, and resting during non-work periods without restriction. · Donkeys choose and carry out to graze, scratch, shelter, roll or explore their physical environment. c.Donkeys Respond Positively to Interactions with Humans e.g. alertness, interest, engagement with people, calm, no fear or stress response, or remove themselves from interacting with humans
a.Human Behaviours Promoting Donkey Agency · Provide donkeys with an ability to choose to move around freely without restriction/restraint while at rest at home. · Allow donkeys to interact with other animals (touch/mutual grooming), and move away from other donkeys if they choose too, including during their work day whenever feasible without hindering their work. · Use a halter when it is necessary to restrict a donkey’s movement. b.Human Behaviours Promoting Donkeys Exhibition of Natural Behaviours · Use recommended welfare friendly methods of restricting donkey’s movement when it necessary to so as to enable them to maintain as much natural movement as possible (e.g. use of harness and rope rather than hobbling) · Allow donkey foals stay with their mothers as much as possible, and provide them with opportunities to socialize and play with other foals if feasible. · Provide donkeys with intervals of rest throughout the day when they are working, and a day of rest at home without working them after lengthy work days to enable them to recuperate. · Provide donkeys with daily opportunities to freely carry out normal behaviours such as rolling, scratching, grazing, and interacting/playing with other donkeys if available while at home and not working. c.Human Behaviours Supporting Positive Interactions with Donkeys · Calmly approach and speak with donkeys to keep them calm and prevent stressful human interactions which cause them to exhibit fear or aggression. · Use body language communication or sound cues and/or as a ‘firefighting’ immediate option only, the presence of soft sticks which are unable to inflict pain can be used as a visual encouragement or light tap to inspire Donkeys to move as needed rather than whipping them which can cause them fear and stress. · Provide information to a handler or any third party how their donkeys are trained and respond to cues · Owners seek to develop owns skill to train and communicate with their donkeys in a compassionate way or ask for support from animal welfare organizations to build their own skills.
¯ DONKEY’S MENTAL STATE WHEN NEEDS MET/HUMAN BEHAVIOURS ADOPTED ¯
Free from fear, distress, anxiety Feels comfortable Expresses happiness and enjoys pleasure Feels Secure, Protected and Confident
Table 9a. Example Five Domains of Welfare Framework for Donkeys Linked with Human Behaviours
PART 2: Using Root Cause Analysis and Five Domains Framework linked with Human Behaviours to Identify Feasible Animal Welfare Issues and Actions for Addressing Them
The steps below outline a process which can be used or adapted to support the identification of behaviours that are feasible for communities to adopt to improve their animals welfare through use of a root cause analysis and species specific five domains of welfare linked with human behaviours.
First identify the animal welfare issues prevalent in the community. Consider using a participatory animal welfare assessment process, ideally involves members of the animal owning community whenever feasible to do so. The T22 Animal Welfare Transect Walk tool can be used to support this process.
Next, seek to understand the root causes of identified animal welfare issues in collaboration with community members or representative key informants from the animal owning community. Consider using the T25 Problem Animaltool to support undertaking a participatory root cause analysis of identified animal welfare issues. An example of root cause analysis for animal welfare issues identified through a participatory animal welfare assessment are illustrated in Figure 9a below.
Once a root cause analysis of welfare issues has been conducted, facilitate a discussion with community members or representative key informants from the animal owning community to the animal welfare issues which may be feasible and of interest for community members and the project to work together to address based on an understanding of their root causes. Seek agreement on the welfare issues which will be prioritized for improvement, and use a species specific five domains framework linked with potential human behaviours (refer to example in Table 9A above) to further discuss and identify the behaviours feasible for community members to adopt to address these welfare issues. Consider inviting animal welfare experts to the discussion to ensure any behaviours identified do not adversely harm animals and are likely to result in desired animal welfare improvements. Refer to the following considerations to help the selection of target behaviours:
How likely it is the behaviour can be changed (when considering the likelihood of change being achieved, think about the barriers and motivators to change in terms of capability, opportunity, and motivation to change of those who perform the behaviour)
How much of an impact adopting the behaviour would have on improving the overall welfare state of the animal in terms of the five domains.
How likely it is that the behaviour (or group of behaviours) will have a positive or negative impact on other, related behaviours.
How easy it will be to measure the behaviour.
Can the project support communities in adopting this behaviour given its available resources and implementation capacity e.g. if the project is being implemented through trained community change agents, can they effectively support communities in adopting this behaviour as needed?
Figure 9a. Example Root Cause Analysis of Donkey Welfare Issues
Table 9b below is an example of the target donkey welfare issues and behaviours identified as feasible for a community and project to address based on the results of the root cause analysis in Figure 9a. These discussions included representative community key informants and change agents, as well as animal welfare experts who helped ensure any behaviours identified support animal welfare improvements and do no harm.
Identified Donkey Welfare Issues Feasible to Address Based on Root Cause Analysis
Identified Behaviour Change Priorities for Addressing Priority Donkey Welfare Issues (Feasible and Appropriate within Local Context)
NUTRITION DOMAIN
a. Donkey is malnourished/skinny due to insufficient provision of quality and quantity of feed - Not feasible to address based on root cause analysis
Not feasible to address at this stage.
HEALTH DOMAIN
a. Excessive eye discharge b. Back Wounds c. Hindquarter wounds d. Overgrown hooves - Not feasible to address based on root cause analysis
a.Human Behaviours for Addressing Eye Discharge · Clean donkey’s eyes daily to remove discharge and debris and check for abnormalities to help mitigate eye problems. · Avoid as far as possible environments with air contamination e.g. during rest if it is not possible to avoid during work · Contact animal health practitioner if one eye is being different to the other eye, swelling, closed eye, thick and have coloured discharge and there is obvious change to the colour of the eye. · Avoid using blinkers and decorative items that dangle around the eyes b.Human Behaviours for Addressing Back Wounds · Wipe down and/or shake out any equipment to remove any accumulated mud or dirt before or after each use to prevent excess accumulation of dirt causing rubbing. · Groom animals carefully to remove dirt and dust from skin before they work to prevent equipment rubbing and causing wounds. · Use back padding under any loads whenever donkeys are using packs or to prevent carts from rubbing, in accordance with welfare promoting instructions for making such back pads using locally available materials (instructions to be provided by project). · Gentle cleaning with clean cloth to clean the wound. · Give the donkey to rest to recover from the wound c.Human Behaviours for Addressing Hindquarter Wounds · Rest animals from work to enable wounds to heal. · Use body and verbal communication or sound cues and/or as a ‘firefighting’ immediate option only and once wounds are healed use soft sticks which are unable to inflict pain as a visual encouragement or a light tap to inspire donkey’s to move as needed rather than whipping them which can cause them fear and stress (Request for a Compassionate Handling training to be provided by an animal welfare organization).
ENVIRONMENT DOMAIN
n/a – no issues identified from transect walk
n/a – no issues identified from transect walk
BEHAVIOUR DOMAIN
n/a – no issues identified from transect walk
· n/a
Table 9b: Priority Animal Welfare Issues and Actions for Addressing Them
PART 3: Using a Five Domains of Animal Welfare Framework Linked with Human Behaviours to Improve Animal Welfare When Unable to Address Root Causes of Animal Welfare Issues
While identifying existing animal welfare issues is a recommended step in community animal welfare improvement projects, it is not uncommon for community members or a project to be constrained in their ability to address the root causes of such issues. For example, it may not be feasible to resolve animal welfare issues whose root cause is communities’ lack of access or availability of financial resources using a Community Engagement Approach where trained community change agents are the primary implementing agents tasked with supporting community behaviour change at the individual household level. When resolving identified animal welfare issues is not feasible, opportunities to increase animals’ positive life experiences nevertheless exist.
Using a species specific five domains framework linked with associated human behaviours, you can facilitate discussions with community members and encourage them to identify and adopt other feasible actions/behaviours to improve the overall net gain in animals’ welfare even when identified welfare issues cannot be addressed. Using this resource can support flexible, solution oriented discussions with communities for improving animal welfare which are cognizant of contextual constraints, and mitigate promotion of unobtainable welfare standards that are not feasible to achieve. Improving animal welfare is more about creating positive change in animals’ welfare status through increasing animals’ positive life experiences so as to tip the balance between negative and positive life experiences. While addressing identified animal welfare issues is always a goal, you can still achieve an overall net gain in animal welfare even when such issues remain unaddressed. Figure 9b below illustrates the concept of this balance of life experiences.
Figure 9b: Balance of Life Experiences (adapted from [2])
To improve animal welfare it is important to seek to understand and assess animals both positive AND negative experiences within each domain and consider how an animal’s experiences within each of the four domains may be contributing to its mental state AND influencing its overall welfare. Thus, in addition to the identified donkey welfare issues (negative experiences) and associated human behaviours that can be adopted to address them which were identified in Table 9b above, Table 9c below provides examples of additional feasible actions identified in discussion with community members to improve their donkeys’ overall positive life experiences identified by using table 9a to generate awareness and discussion amongst community members. This demonstrates how this facilitator resource can be used to promote animal welfare improvements through focusing on ways to promote positive life experience rather than solely focus on addressing welfare issues. Without it, these opportunities for improving donkeys welfare through enhancing positive life experiences would not have been identified through the transect walk alone, which focussed more on assessing animals’ welfare to identify issues. It is recommended to prioritize elements within each of the domains instead of focussing on all efforts for improving an animals’ welfare within fewer domains to the extent feasible. As such, for this exercise, communities were encouraged to identify ways they could improve their animals’ positive life experiences within the domains of environment, behaviour and nutrition since all of their previously identified issues and behaviours were associated within the one domain of health.
Donkey Welfare Needs/Positive Life Experiences
Identified Potential Behaviour Change Priorities to Improve Donkey’s Welfare (Feasible and Appropriate within Local Context)
NUTRITION DOMAIN
a. Donkeys feed on small portions and often
Human Behaviours Promoting Improved Donkey Feeding a. Provide donkeys with feed and water 2-3 times a day throughout their working day (every 3 hours or 2-3 times/day).
HEALTH DOMAIN
N/A – priority donkey welfare issues already identified for health domain (refer to table 9b)
N/A - human behaviours to address priority donkey health issues already identified (refer to table 9b)
ENVIRONMENT DOMAIN
a.Thermal Comfort/Weather Protection · Prevention of adverse physiological reactions from sun/heat and adverse weather conditions b.Space for Exhibiting Natural Behaviours · Donkeys have space to roll in the dirt and scratch when not working.
a.Human Behaviours Related to Thermal Comfort/Weather Protection · Rest donkeys in shade or shelter while on breaks during working hours to protect them from the heat of the sun and other adverse weather conditions. b.Human Behaviours Promoting Space for Donkeys to Exhibit Natural Behaviours · Provide adequate accessible space for donkeys to roll, scratch, and lay down without hindrance of equipment when not working.
BEHAVIOUR DOMAIN
a.Ability/agency to exhibit natural behaviours/interact with other animals · Donkeys can choose to interact with other animals of their species (e.g. touch/mutual grooming, play) or remove themselves from the presence of other animals. · Donkeys can choose to carry out normal behaviours such as rolling, lying down/resting, and resting during non-work periods. b.Donkeys Respond Positively to Interactions with Humans
a.Human Behaviours Supporting Donkeys Exhibition of Natural Behaviours · Provide donkeys with daily opportunities to freely carry out normal behaviours such as rolling, scratching, grazing, and interacting/playing with other donkeys (if present) while at home and not working. b.Human Behaviours Supporting Positive Interactions with Donkeys · Use communication or sound cues and/or the presence of soft tipped sticks which can be used as a visual encouragement or light tap to inspire Donkey’s to move as needed rather than whipping them which can cause them fear and stress (also supports addressing whipping wounds under health domain).
Table 9c: Additional Actions for Increasing Positive Life Experiences of Donkeys to Improve their Overall Welfare Status
This resource will walk you through the process of identifying effective behaviour change strategies most likely to be effective in support the adoption of desired behaviours based your identification of what needs to change in terms of COM-B. This resource has three parts that needs to be used step-by-step to identify the appropriate strategy and has been adapted and informed by the Behaviour Change Wheel: A Guide to Designing Interventions Book by Lou Atkins, Robert West, and Susan Michie [21]. The first part explores what you need to do after identifying your COM-B Community level behaviour diagnosis; and how to categorize/map the gathered information in a strategic manner to point you to the appropriate intervention function. Part 2 focuses on identifying the relevant behaviour change techniques to further sharpen the strategy and the activity designing. To use this resource, you will need to have completed steps 1-4 in your Behaviour Change Planning Table.
If the information contained in this facilitator resource is something you have not heard of before, please go to the Human Behaviour Change Learning Module.
Approaches for Working with Communities: Community Development Approach, Community Engagement Approach, Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach
Behavioural Drivers (COM-B): Behaviour Change Diagnosis and Planning
Project Support: Facilitator Resources, Training, Documentation and Reporting
Part 1: Identifying Effective Behaviour Change Intervention Functions
The behaviours we observe people exhibiting occur because of three, often interacting conditions or drivers: 1) capability, 2) opportunity, 3) motivation, commonly referred to as COM-B. These three components of behaviour are defined below, along with their subcomponents:
Capability: individual’s psychological and physical ability to enact or engage in the behaviour, and includes having the necessary knowledge and skills
1. Physical capability (C-ph) – physical skill, strength, or stamina
2. Psychological capability (C-ps) – knowledge, cognitive and interpersonal skills, memory, attention, and decision processes, behavioural regulation
Opportunity: factors which fall outside the individual which make the behaviour possible or prompt it
3. Physical opportunity (O-ph) – physical environment and resources, opportunities afforded by the environment involving time, resources, locations, cues, physical ‘affordance’
4. Social opportunity (O-so) – social influences, opportunity afforded by interpersonal influences, social cues and cultural norms that influence the way that we think about things
Motivation: reflective and automatic mechanisms/cognitive processes that activate or inhibit the behaviour including habitual processes, emotional responding, as well as analytical decision making
5. Reflective motivation (M-Re) – professional/social role and identity, optimism, goals, processes involving plans (self-conscious intentions) and evaluations (beliefs about what is good and bad, about capabilities)
Through your consultations with communities, ideally through COM-B diagnosis which helps you to identify the barriers and motivators (e.g. Facilitator Resource No. 11 Behaviour Change/COM-B Diagnosis Community Guide Question), you should have some degree of understanding of factors related to the target actors’ capability, motivation, and opportunities causing the undesirable behaviours underlying observed animal welfare issues (Refer to completed Step 3 column of theBehaviour Change Planning Table.
You can then use the table below to identify the most effective type of intervention functions to consider implementing to promote adoption of the desired behaviour based on yourCOM-B Diagnosis of what needs to change for the desired behaviour to be adopted [25]. It is not uncommon for each behaviour to have numerous drivers, and each may therefore require numerous types of interventions be undertaken to effectively change the behaviour, as shown in the figure 13a below.
Each of the types of intervention function are further defined in the table below [25]:
Intervention Functions
Definitions
Examples
Education
Increasing knowledge or understanding
• Providing information to promote better care for equids and create understanding about consequences. • Raise awareness of animal husbandry practices that support positive welfare states
Persuasion
Using communication to induce positive or negative feelings or stimulate action
• Using imagery and/or respected messengers to motivate increase in the feeling of how important your equid is.
Incentivisation
Creating expectation of reward
• Having a system that rewards practising the desired behaviour, such as being celebrated as the owner of the healthiest equid.
Coercion
Creating expectation of punishment or cost
• An animal owning community-based organization adopt bylaws that include financial consequences for members who mistreat their animals • Working with law enforcement officers to punish those who mistreat or do not take good care of their equids.
Training
Impacting skills
• Providing trainings on how to communicate with the equids without whipping. • Provide training on handling or farriery techniques
Restriction
Using rules to reduce the opportunity to engage in the target behaviour (or to increase the target behaviour by reducing the opportunity to engage in competing behaviours)
• Prohibiting using equids to carry loads over a certain weight, in relation to the equid weight to avoid overloading, or not using the equid without equid-friendly harness.
Environmental restructuring
Changing the physical or social context
• Printing posters (even billboard) and pinning them in the environment as a reminder for the need to practice the desired behaviour. • Encouraging equid owners’ associations or local administration to create/facilitate animal shelters at marketplaces to allow animals to rest comfortably after transporting goods to market
Modelling
Providing an example for people to aspire or imitate
• Identifying and using leaders or community change agents, who already practice the desired behaviour for others to copy them.
Enablement
Increasing means/reducing barriers to increase capability or opportunity.
• Providing social support groups, for people to feel part of similar group doing the same action or behaviour. • Supporting animal owning groups to form groups to do bulk purchase of feed for their animals.
Table 13a - Examples: Providing information to promote better care of animals, raise awareness of animal husbandry practices that support positive welfare states
Part 2: Identifying Complementary Policy Categories
Once you have identified the intervention function, the next step will be to explore if there are relevant Policy Categories that you can use to sharpen your strategy to help you embed the desired behaviour. The policy category can be used as part of your asks in the message you will craft when you are using this approach to identify gaps or to anchor your interventions direction even if you are not going to directly engage in policy advocacy work.
[25]
Part 3: Identifying Behaviour Change Techniques Relevant to Selected Intervention Functions
Once you have identified the appropriate intervention functions and policy categories for each behaviour, create a table like the example below, and refer to the table of behaviour change techniques (BCTs) related to each intervention function provided below, and select the behaviour change techniques most likely to be appropriate to the community context in which you are working.
You can download the free Behaviour Change Techniques Taxonomy v1 application (BCTTv1) to support your identification of the most used behaviour change techniques relevant to each intervention function, or refer to the table below which provides definitions and examples behaviour change categories with examples.
S.N.
Intervention Functions Definition
Behaviour Change Techniques* *All BCTs could potentially be considered for any intervention type, however the BCT’s listed here are those which have been most used and evidenced as effective for each type of intervention function within the behaviour change science literature.
Education: Increase knowledge or understanding
· Information about social and environmental consequences · Information about consequences of inaction/not adopting desired behaviour e.g., to animals and/or their owners Feedback on behaviour · Feedback on outcome(s) of behaviour · Prompts/cues · Self-monitoring of behaviour
Persuasion: Use communication to induce positive or negative feelings to stimulate action
· Credible source · Information about social and environmental consequences · Information about consequences of inaction/not adopting desired behaviour e.g., to animals and/or their owners · Feedback on behaviour · Feedback on outcome(s) of behaviour
Incentivization: Create an expectation of reward
· Feedback on behaviour · Feedback on outcome(s) of behaviour. · Monitoring of behaviour by others without feedback. · Monitoring of outcome(s) of behaviour without feedback. · Self-monitoring of behaviour.
Coercion: Create and expectation of punishment or cost
· Feedback on behaviour. · Feedback on outcome(s) of behaviour. · Monitoring of behaviour by others without feedback. · Monitoring of outcome(s) of behaviour without feedback. · Self-monitoring of behaviour.
Training: Impart skills
· Demonstration of the behaviour. · Instruction on how to perform the behaviour. · Feedback on behaviour. · Feedback on outcome(s) of behaviour. · Monitoring of behaviour by others without feedback. · Monitoring of outcome(s) of behaviour without feedback. · Self-monitoring of behaviour. · Behavioural practice and rehearsal · Instructions on how to perform the behaviour
Restrictions: Use of rules to reduce the opportunity to engage in the behavior
There are no BCTs identified as ‘most frequently used’ for Restriction because BCTs are focused on changing the way people think, feel, and react rather than the way external environments limit their behaviour.
Environmental Restructuring: change the physical environment
· Adding objects to the environment. · Prompts/cues. · Restructuring the physical environment.
Modelling: Provide an example for people to aspire to or emulate
· Demonstration of the behaviour
Enablement: Increase means or reduce barriers to increase capability (beyond education or training) or opportunity (beyond environmental restructuring)
· Demonstration of the behaviour. · Social support (unspecified). · Social support (practical). · Goal setting (behaviour). · Goal setting (outcome). · Adding objects to the environment. · Problem solving. · Action planning. · Self-monitoring of behaviour. · Restructuring the physical environment. · Review behaviour goal(s). · Review outcome goal(s).
Table 13b Intervention functions (IFs) and frequently used BCTs
Next, use the APEASE criteria also provided in a table below to help you narrow your selection of behaviour change techniques. Although the APEASE criteria provides a structured way of narrowing appropriate BCTs, it is important to draw on local knowledge and your own expertise when selecting the most appropriate intervention functions and BCTs to be implemented in each context. When narrowing your selection, it is also helpful to consider the BCTs used most frequently before considering those used less frequently [21].
Once you have completed the activity, use the identified BCT’s which meet the APEASE criteria to inform the development of effective community engagement activities to address the barriers and motivators identified as needing to change. List community engagement project activities within the Step 5 column of the Behaviour Change Planning Table provided within the facilitator resources.
Criteria
Description
Affordability
Acceptable in terms of project budget. It does not matter how effective or even cost effective it may be if it cannot be afforded. An intervention is affordable if within an acceptable budget it can be delivered to, or accessed by, all for whom it could be relevant or of benefit.
Practicability
Extent to which it can be delivered and designed through the means intended to the target population and ease of adoption by the community given the means available to them. You know, or have great cause to believe, that the barriers to adoption of behaviours hoped to be addressed by the intervention are not beyond the scope of project to address
Effectiveness and cost effectiveness
Effectiveness refers to the effect size of the intervention in relation to the desired objectives within the local context. It is important when weighing intervention strategy options to the extent to which the intervention will have a direct, significant impact on solving/reducing the severity of observed animal welfare issues and promote the adoption of desired behaviours, and whether it has potential to affect change in many welfare issues/behaviours, and/or have spill over/generalizability to other behaviours and people. Cost Effectiveness refers to the ratio of cost to effect. If two interventions are equally effective it is always recommended to pursue the more cost-efficient strategy. If one option is more effective but less cost effective, then other criteria such as affordability should be considered.
Acceptability
Acceptability refers to the extent to which an intervention strategy will be judged as appropriate by relevant stakeholders. Acceptability may be different for different stakeholders.
Side effects/safety
Side effects/safety refers to the extent a particular intervention may have unwanted side-effects or unintended consequences. Consider whether interventions may cause harm to animals, people, or the environment before deciding whether to proceed.
Equity
An important consideration is the extent to which an intervention strategy may reduce or increase disparities in standard of living, health, or well-being for different sectors of society.
Table 13 c APEASE Criteria - adapted from [21]
The table below provides an example of a completed behaviour change intervention functions and behaviour change techniques identified based on COM-B diagnosis findings for changing whipping behaviour in Kenya. Consider creating a similar table to support your own behaviour change intervention planning using the human behaviour change intervention planning approach outlined in this resource.
Behaviour Change Statement: Guiding donkeys using verbal and body communication whenever donkeys are required to move.
Most Relevant/Recently Used Behaviour Change Techniques (BCT)
Does BCT meet the APEASE Criteria in the context of the desired behaviour?
Education
Psychological capability
Providing information about the consequences of whipping.
Yes, it is affordable, practical, acceptable, with positive side effects on improving and knowing what is needed to improve the health of the donkey
Persuasion
Reflective Motivation
Using dram/skits to highlight the benefits of guiding a donkey without whipping to elicit emotional response.
Acceptable, practical, not so costly and can reach a wide audience of people depending on the delivery mode.
Environmental Restructure
Social Opportunity
Putting cues/leaflets in visible places to remind the donkey users and the community on how to treat their animals
Yes, affordable, acceptable and may lead to other additional benefits such as awareness on donkeys health and how to guide them
Training
Physical Capability
Teaching the owners how to guide without whip, by using body language
Acceptable, practical, socially acceptable but may not be affordable as it requires one on one training of an individual
Table 13d Example of Completed Intervention and Behaviour Change Intervention Selection for Changing Whipping Behaviour in Kenya
Facilitator's Note:
It should be noted that this guidance focuses on identifying intervention functions from the behaviour change wheel, however the behaviour change wheel can also be used to identify policy categories to support the intervention. However, if barriers to the adoption of desired behaviours are identified amongst communities that may require policy level change, you may wish to consider conducting this activity using the behaviour change wheel’s policy categories as well, to identify those which best support delivery of the intervention functions [21].
Consider downloading the BCTTv1app from iTunes or google play to further help you.
This tool encourages people to think about how their animal(s) feels based on their experience. By mapping animals’ experiences and associated feelings over time, it allows community members to see the cumulative positive and/or negative impact of these experiences. In this way, the tool can provide insights into how communities perceive their animals’ experiences and understand their feelings and needs.
Tool purpose:
Time needed:
• Generate communities’ understanding of how daily activities affect animals’ feelings contribute to animals’ positive or negative welfare states and impact their quality of life. • Improve communities’ compassion for their animals. • Support communities to identify opportunities for providing positive life experiences of their animals. • Motivate communities to increase the provision and frequency of positive life experiences of their animals, as well as other people in their lives. • Help identify gaps in communities’ understanding of animal welfare and animal sentience which can help inform project activity planning
2-2.5 hours
Materials needed:
Facilitator prompt sheets/visual aids including Balance of Life Experiences scale (refer to the animal welfare learning module for example), Five Domains of animal welfare, pens, and paper (not limited to paper, the facilitator can explore different ways the different communities want to document their information)
Stages of Behaviour Change: Pre-contemplation Stage
Project Support: Participatory Learning and Action Tools, Training
Specific Topics: Animal Husbandry and Management; Animal Handling; Animal Welfare, Feelings and Needs; Animal Health and Services; Compassion/Empathy; Community Change Agents
T18a: A day in the Life of an Animal
“A day in a life of an animal”
Step 1
Form 2-3 small groups of 3-5 people depending on the number of participants. The more groups the longer the activity may take.
Step 2
Ask the groups to think about the animals in their community, and to choose an individual animal that they will explore together. Ask the group for a summary of the individual animal, for example age, name, whether they work. If using pens and paper this animal can be drawn in the middle, or if reporting verbally then the participants can give a quick overview in the introduction to the group in Step 5.
Be prepared to ensure the group focuses on one example (e.g., a horse working in a brick kiln, a chicken providing eggs).
Step 3
Ask each group to draw a clock with 24hrs and briefly describe what the animal is doing over the course of the day (e.g., waking up, eating/drinking, being prepared for work, working, resting) and map these on the 24 clocks. Check to ensure all key periods and activities have been included, asking probing questions if you think anything may be missing.
Step 4
Then ask each group to pick at least 3 time points throughout the day (recommended to choose at least as many time points as people in their group), and consider in more detail what the animal is experiencing at each of these time points including: • What activities are/ is the animal doing/engaged in (e.g., feeding)?
Prompt the group to think in terms of the five domains. Often people will focus on tangible things like food and water. Try to also ensure that other activities are also covered, for example free time, rest, social contact. Refer to the five domains of animal welfare visual aid if available to support their discussion.
• What are the frequency and duration of these activities/experiences? • How does each activity/experience make the animal feel (e.g., experiencing pleasurable tastes) and influence the animal’s mental state?
Some people find it easier to reflect on how they would feel in that situation. So, for example discussing quality rest – you could ask, “how do you feel when you don’t sleep well? Can you sleep when it is very noisy around? Has anyone ever been prevented from sleeping because they were worried about something (that was going to happen to them the next day)?”
Step 5
Next, bring the groups together and ask them to give a short introduction to their chosen animal’s day to the whole group. Each person in the group can present at least one time point so that between them they cover the full day.
Next, facilitate a discussion using the points below as a discussion guide: • Probe for more details on their animals’ daily experiences/activities where appropriate and needed to encourage them to think about and identify the nature of these experiences in terms of whether they may be positive or negative where this may not yet be clear.
For example, with rest, can the animals move freely? Are they restrained up next to someone or something they don’t like or fear? Are they restrained so that they cannot relax properly and achieve good quality rest? Is the environment noisy, preventing them from sleeping? How do their rest patterns align with their natural needs?
• Discuss whether an activity and/or experience is truly positive or whether it reflects an alleviation of a negative experience. For example, providing water to a dehydrated animal is alleviating a negative experience, whereas play is (most likely) a positive experience. - As negative and positive experiences are not always the direct opposite of each other, it is important to discuss them separately e.g., is the experience negative or not; is the experience positive or not.
• Encourage discussion of how the frequency, duration, and intensity of experiences differ, and how this can impact an animal’s quality of life.
For example, if an animal is wounded in an accident, this may be a very intense experience and painful at the time. However, if the animal is in a secure environment and receives prompt and effective treatment, then the negative experience will be lasting. However, if the animal does not receive treatment, then the negative experience will last longer. Even if the injury is minor and the pain experienced is not initially intense, if left untreated the pain will increase, and the animal may need to be active or work with the painful injury or be unable to rest properly if in pain. These experiences will accumulate, making the overall balance of these experiences will be negative, and lower the animals’ resilience to other negative experiences. In this example, a short but high intensity experience may have less impact on the balance of experiences than a less intense but longer lasting experience.
• Ask what opportunities are provided for their animal to experience comfort, pleasure, interest, confidence, and the ability to make choices and feel a sense of being in control? - For example, if they are provided with shelter, do they have the choice about when to enter the shelter and when to remain outside, allowing them to adjust for their thermal comfort and security (e.g., some animals, such as horses, may feel very trapped in a shelter, whereas other animals, such as dogs, may feel a lot safer within a shelter than outside).
• Based on this discussion, where do you believe your animal sits on the balance of life experiences scale and why? (Refer to the balance of life experience visual aid if available)
Once concluded, summarize their discussion in terms of the following points: • Key points in the animal’s day (e.g., rest, work, eat, drink, are tied up (movement restricted), roam freely). • The range of their animals’ experiences and feelings. • How animals’ feelings would change if experiences were very frequent or very prolonged. • Highlight where the animal sits on the balance of life experiences scale and why.
Step 6
Next use the following questions to encourage participants to reflect and learn from the activity:
• Was there anything that surprised you? • What did you learn from this activity? • How representative do you think this is of your other animals/animal in the community? • Is there anything that you think you could do differently in the future to improve your animal’s quality of life based on your learnings from this activity?
Encourage them to identify and/or draw attention to the positive aspects of what they already do as a means to promote reflection and learning and motivation to do more of what is already feasible for them, rather than focusing on what they can’t.
Step 7
Finally, draw the activity to a conclusion using the following points: • Reflect on the original aims and purpose of the activity and draw conclusions relevant to these • Highlight key reflections about what participants learned doing this activity. • Summarize what the group concluded they could do to minimise negative experiences and/or increase positive experiences in their animals’ lives.
T18b: The Life of an Animal
The life of an animal
Step 1
If doing this exercise in a separate session from the day in a life activity, begin with Step 1 and 2 from the “A day in the Life of an Animal” activity above first.
If conducting this activity in the same session following completion of the day in the life activity, skip to step 2 below.
Step 2
Explain they will be mapping their animal’s experiences over the course of the animal’s lifetime and ask them to decide how they wish to represent the lifetime of their animal’s life cycle visually e.g., table, circle, list, timeline.
Then ask each group to identify the major life cycles/stages/time points of their animal, and plot these in accordance with how they decided to represent the animal’s lifetime. Encourage them to identify at least as many life events as people in their group, ensuring they include consideration of the animal’s life cycle from birth, growth, reproduction, working up to end of life as well.
Step 3
Once the life stages/time points of their animal are identified in step 2, ask each group to explore in more detail what the animal is experiencing at each stage, you can use the following to guide the discussions:
• What activities are some of the activities the animal is doing/engaged in at each stage (e.g., working, breeding)?
Prompt the group to think in terms of the five domains for the life cycle/stage of the animal they have picked to focus on. Often people will focus on tangible things like food and water. Try to also ensure that other activities are also covered, for example free time, rest, social contact. Refer to the five domains of animal welfare visual aid if available to support their discussion. • What are the frequency and duration of these activities/experiences? • How does each activity/experience make the animal feel (e.g., experiencing pleasurable tastes, experiencing positive human-animal interactions, experiencing and exhibiting positive natural behaviours, etc.) and influence the animal’s mental state?
Some people find it easier to reflect on how they would feel in that situation. So, for example discussing quality rest – you could ask, “how do you feel when you don’t sleep well? Can you sleep when it is very noisy around? Has anyone ever been prevented from sleeping because they were worried about something (that was going to happen to them the next day)?”
Explore the different life stages in more detail considering what the animal is experiencing at each stage. Details to be discussed should consider both the activity (e.g., weaning) and the associated mental state (e.g., distress/fear/panic if forcibly weaned and put in isolation). • What are the frequency and duration of these life experiences? • How does each experience make the animal feel (e.g., experiencing pleasurable tastes, experiencing positive human-animal interactions, experiencing and exhibiting positive natural behaviours, etc.) and influence the animal’s mental state?
Some people find it easier to reflect on how they would feel in that situation. So, for example discussing being separated from other animals and kept alone – you could ask, “how do you feel when you are isolated from friends and family? Has anyone ever been prevented from socializing with your network of support?”
Step 4
After discussion, bring the groups together and ask them to present the lifetime of their animals to the whole group. Each person in the groups should present at least one time point/life stage, which between them covers the entire lifespan. Encourage discussion of how the animal’s welfare changes over their lifetime using the guiding questions below, and encourage a process of reflecting on the exercise, generalising, and application. Conclude where this animal sits on the Balance of Life Experiences chart.
Step 5
Once finished, summarize key reflections and learnings from discussions including:
• Key points in the animal’s life (e.g., birth, early life, weaning, working/productive life, ownership changes, end of life). • The range of experiences and feelings, and how these change over time. • How quality of life is impacted by experiences that are very frequent or very long. key reflections and what people discovered by participating in this exercise. • What the group concluded they could do to minimise negative and add more positive experiences, including any immediate actions vs longer term changes needed.
Conclude by reflecting on the original aims and purpose of the exercise and draw conclusions relevant to these, and ensure concluding reflections highlight where the animal sits on the balance of life experiences scale and why.
Facilitator's Notes
Preparatory work (things to consider before the exercise):
It is important that participants have been socialized in the concepts of the five domains of animal welfare and balance of quality life experiences prior to beginning this activity. If they have not yet had an introduction to these concepts, you will need to build in more time to introduce these concepts in advance.
Consider your target audience (community, community facilitators) for this exercise.
Establish your motivations and goals for doing this exercise with that group of participants.
Based on this, decide whether you will run both activities and only run one of the activities.
Establish what species/animals are you are likely to, or need to, discuss and why (consider whether there is benefit of having same species groups e.g., equid owners).
Do you feel confident with the application of this task to those species? Do you feel confident discussing the range of positive and negative experiences for the different animal species that you may be discussing during the exercise? Do you need to seek some further support or clarification?
Consider a manageable group size (too small may produce too little discussion, too big may result in too much variation, debate, or not enabling everyone to participate fully).
Be prepared with information to respond to how a community views the animal experiences. We suggest that in advance of the session you have a list of ‘red flags’ – practices that are very dangerous to welfare and need an immediate response – and an idea of what the ideal situation would look like, so that you are clear on what you can praise/want to see.
Consider how you may capture these results with literate and illiterate groups (use photo to capture if they have used different symbols to represent the life of an animal)
In this tool it is important to focus on increasing opportunities for positive experiences, and not only opportunities for reducing negative experiences.
for “The life of an animal” activity, the following suggestions also apply:
Consider how the community/culture would most likely break down the life of an animal e.g., by age, by life event, and work with them to establish the best way of doing this. Ensure that all the critical stages/life cycles from birth to end of life are captured in the discussion even though the classification might vary.
Be prepared to challenge or fill in gaps of key life stages that may be missed.
Next Steps
This exercise may be used to improve communities understanding of how experiences can impact on an animal, promote understanding of the concept of animal welfare generally, and/or as a precursor to community action planning by helping to generate discussion and ideas about how community members can provide more opportunities for their animals to have more positive life experiences and a greater sense of control choice and feeling of control. Next steps will therefore vary depending on your intended objectives of use of this tool, and in what project phase you are implementing it. Think about how the information or outcomes generated from this activity may be used or help inform your next steps. You may also wish to consider whether they can serve as an indicator of change which you may wish to assess again later. (Although if this uncovers incidents of welfare practices that are unacceptable then the facilitators should explore using the available resources within this guide how to address them).
This resource outlines key information for community facilitators to support effective group formation and management including the process of group formation, key characteristics of successful community groups and factors influencing community group success, as well as common challenges and any advice for mitigating them.
Approaches for Working With Communities: Community Development Approach
Project Support: Facilitator Resources, Training
Specific Topics: Group Formation/Strengthening
14a. Overview of Group Formation Process
The process of group formation begins with community mobilization. This entails engaging the community to come together to support a common shared interest and achieve a particular goal or objective.
The process of group formation was first outlined by psychologist Bruce Tuckman and describes how teams (or small groups) move through stages which are further defined below and include: forming, storming, norming, and performing, and adjourning (or mourning). The figure below illustrates Tuckman’s team development model, where each of the five stages of team development represent a step on the team-building ladder. As the group members climb the ladder, they move from a random assembly of strangers into a high-performing team or group capable of working towards a common goal.
Fig 14a: Process of Group Formation (Adapted from [70, 111])
The five stages of small group development are further defined below.
Forming: At this stage, the individuals or community group members begin to know each other, understand the purpose of the team or group, and looking for direction from the group leader.
Storming: At this stage, people start to push against the established boundaries. Conflict or friction can also arise between team members as their true characters – and their preferred ways of working surface and clash with other people
Norming: People start to resolve their differences, appreciate one another's strengths, and respect the authority of their leader.
Performing: The group is in flow and performing to its full potential. With hard work and structured processes, the team is likely to achieve its goals efficiently.
Adjourning (or Mourning): Many groups reach this stage naturally. For example, projects come to an end, or permanent groups are disbanded, and people redeployed.
It should be noted this model and stages are not a one-way street. Groups may go back and forth between stages. For example, when a new group member joins a group it can disrupt the group dynamic, or when it decided to undertake a new collective action it may regress and need to re-evaluate the groups’ goals and members’ roles and responsibilities. Thus, when a group arrives at the performing stage, it is important to continue observing the groups progress and assess whether there is any regression which may need to be addressed.
Follow the steps below to support facilitation of a group’s progress through the stages of group formation and strengthening:
Identify the stage that your group is at from the descriptions above.
Consider what you/the group’s members and/or leadership can do to support the group’s progress to the next stage
Schedule regular reviews of group progress and adjust behaviours and leadership approach accordingly.
14b. Factors Influencing Community Group Success
Factors influencing group success are outlined below [88] [112]:
Similarities of Attitudes and Values: One of the strongest sources of group cohesiveness is the similarity in attitudes and values among group members. This plays a key role when focusing on a particular goal that the whole group believe in. Having a clearly defined group vision is therefore critical to group success.
Size of the Group: Small groups are effective. The larger the size of the group, the less cohesive the group is. The main reasons for this are: i. When the group is small, its members have constant face to face contacts. Thus, there will be high degree of interaction and communication with each other. In large groups, the possibility of interaction among members is less. ii. As group size increases, it becomes more difficult to get the group to agree on common goals and activities and expression of disagreement and dissatisfaction increases. iii. Another problem with large size groups is that there is a likelihood of forming small groups within the large groups. This would result in the dilution of the common group goal thus increasing the extent of power politics play. This tends to decrease the overall cohesiveness. iv. Studies have shown that if all the members of the group are of the same sex, then small groups have better cohesion than large ones. But when the groups were made up of both males and females, the large groups have better cohesion.
Time: It is quite natural that the more time people spend with one another, the more they will get to know each other and more tendency there will be to get closer to each other, thus, strengthening the degree of cohesiveness.
Location: Location of the group plays an important role in determining the cohesiveness. Where members of a group are located close together separated from other groups, they will develop greater cohesiveness because of constant face to face interaction. Where there is no dividing line between one group and another, cohesion is more difficult to achieve because a chain of interactions develops.
Difficulty in Entry: The more difficult it is to get in a group, the more cohesive that group becomes. The reasons are that in exclusive and elite groups the members are selected based on certain characteristics and these characteristics being common to all add to the degree of liking and attraction towards each other. The more exclusive the group the more is the closeness among members. As the groups are not easy to join, the selected members feel a sense of pride and accomplishment.
Inter Dependency: When each member of a group has independent activities, the cohesiveness among the members of such group will be less as compared to the group whose members are doing the operations which are dependent upon each other, thus, mutual dependency leads to greater cohesiveness.
Group Leadership Behaviour: The behaviour of the group leadership has a direct influence on the degree of cohesiveness that exists within a group. The leader can make close relations difficult by creating unhealthy competition among members. On the other hand, he can build solidarity by rewarding cooperative behaviour. The cohesive group can help attain the group goals more effectively, if the group members are properly inspired by their leader. A stable and accepted leadership structure. Comprised of honest individuals who demonstrate dedication and sufficient expertise/competency is therefore important to a group’s success.
Member Turnover: To make a group more cohesive, there is need for some degree of stable relationships among members. The higher the degree of member turnover, the less cohesive a group becomes. this is because the more frequently members leave a particular group, the more time it will take for new and old members to get to know each other and re-establish trust and a willingness to cooperate.
Threat: Common threats or challenges are a very powerful force which can unify community members and support group formation, particularly when: i. The perceived threat comes from outside the group ii. Cooperation can help over-come the threat/challenge, and iii. There is little or no change to evade experiencing the threat For example, when there is a perceived threat of poor leadership within a community, community members can become motivated to come together as united front to ensure the threatening party has less chance to succeed and take advantage of the community.
Shared Goals and Previous Successes: When a group achieves a meaningful goal, the cohesiveness of the group increases because the success is shared by all the members and each one feels responsible for the achievement. If the group agrees on the purpose and direction of its activities, this serves to bind the group together. Having a common purpose/shared interest and well defined and agreed upon goals objectives is critical for group success. Regular review of vision, mission, and objectives is also helpful to promoting group success.
Cooperation: Sometimes the general atmosphere of group enhances cohesiveness.
In addition to effective leadership, factors which are important to promoting a positive group atmosphere and group cooperation include:
• A comprehensive constitution and by-laws agreed by all members, where rules are in use/enforced • Having clear mechanisms for the sharing benefits and liabilities amongst members • Effective participation of group members, which can be supported by having clearly defined tasks, and membership responsibilities which are shared. • Effective participation of group members with equal representation of all members. • Strong interpersonal skills for team building • Effective and timely internal conflict resolution mechanisms. • Members respect each other. • Having regular meetings. • Having well established and agreed communication channels within the group, as well as for communication with non-members.
Other general group characteristics contributing to group success include [88] [112]:
Enhance welfare of other members.
Group resources are managed as agreed by group members.
Leaders are democratically elected at specified intervals.
All members are afforded an equal chance/opportunity of being elected leaders.
Group membership is clearly defined.
There is proper record keeping and documentation.
Transparency and accountability.
Continuous acquisition of new skills
In contrast, factors which can contribute to group failure include [88] [112]:
Poor leadership
Unclear vision/ objectives
Poor interpersonal relationship
Poor communication
Undefined tasks
A weak constitution /by laws
Non-adherence to constitution
Lack of mechanisms on sharing benefits
Poor participation
Weak conflict resolution and transformation mechanism
Unwillingness to acquire new skills
Weak interpersonal skills for team building
14c. Common Challenges in Community-based Organization Governance and Recommendations for Addressing Them
Examples of common challenges faced by community-based organizations are outlines below [88]:
Ineffective leadership by political, community and/or religious leaders
Inadequate political good-will from the leaders who are currently in office and out of office
Conflicts, infighting and splinters within groups
Conflict of interest by leaders, government officers, donor agencies, development partners and other stakeholders
External interference from technical officers, local and political leaders
Mismanagement and misappropriation of community project resources
Inadequate resources
Dependency syndrome
Inadequate organizational and management capacity
Poor governance
Low level of community participation and contributions
Poverty
Retrogressive culture
Hostile natural factors
Poor policy framework
Clannism/nepotism/tribalism
Illiteracy
Language barrier
Top – down approach to development
Differences in socio economic status
Dominance by influential community leaders (pioneer syndrome)
Differences based on gender and discrimination
In addition, the following challenges have been identified related to facilitating group formation and strengthening [112]:
May take long time.
If not managed well, might polarise/benefit a specific section of the community.
Misrepresentation of the group.
Conflicts may delay progress.
Might not address individual expectations.
Excluded members may sabotage.
Some individuals might dominate or have adverse roles.
Guidance for addressing some of these common challenges facing community based organization success are outlined below [88]:
Lack of trust
Trust is crucial to teamwork, and it starts with people knowing each other. Group members need to be acquainted, both professionally and personally, particularly in projects where tensions will run high at some point. Otherwise, members won’t understand each other, they won’t want to engage because they haven’t made that human connection and they won’t fully trust each other.
Conflict and tension
Conflict or a difference of opinion can be healthy and, if carefully managed, can trigger useful debates. It can make people think differently, expanding knowledge and insight; innovation can happen and results flourish. Different opinions within a group should not be seen as a bad thing. The group should put in place a mechanism to handle conflict whenever it arises.
Not sharing information
Knowledge is not power – unless it’s shared. Group members all bring a unique set of skills, knowledge, experience, and wisdom to the table. Effective groups fearlessly share regularly and generously for the benefit of everyone and for the benefit of the project’s success. This makes the capability of the whole group grow and gives the group more power. Leadership should strive to ensure that information is freely shared among members.
Low engagement
Group engagement is crucial to the group success. If engaged, group members will be interested in what they do, committed to the group mission and willing to go the extra mile. They are there in body as well as mentally and emotionally. The key to engagement is involvement – by involving others you make it impossible to stay detached.
Lack of transparency
Without transparency, trust will suffer – both within the group and outside. Transparency is becoming the presumed norm in project and programme management and expectations are growing. It starts at the top: the more senior you are, the more responsibility you must be a role model for this. Group members will follow the leader’s behaviours, good or bad. When this is done well, it can have a positive cascade effect throughout the organisation.
No long-term thinking
Group leaders must get beyond day-to-day urgencies, see the big picture, and consider how all parts fit together. For group members, this means being able to think beyond your own area, about how you fit into the wider group and how you impact the groups’ business. This is about group sustainability and long-term success. Everyone is busy, but just being busy is not enough. Long-term group success requires long-term thinking.
Badly perceived, not delivering
A group has a brand, an image and a reputation created by the actions and behaviours of the group members. A large part of the perception is driven by how well the group delivers on expectations and promises made. Community facilitators and group leaders need to make sure that everyone understands and takes responsibility for their roles in creating the perception of the group. This includes both what is delivered by the group and how it is delivered.
Poor change management
Change is constant and unless carefully managed, it can be detrimental to the group progress and results. Change starts and ends with communication. Whenever you think you’ve communicated enough, you need to communicate some more – and it needs to be interactive: listen, talk, and involve. Be aware of the change curve, or the four predictable stages of change: denial/resistance, emotional, hopeful, commitment. Each stage is needed, but how long someone stays at each stage can be managed and kept to a minimum.
Working in silos
Silo working is a reality for many groups. Group members may sit side by side but not really work together. A great group can be like the three musketeers – all for one and one for all. So, if you are in a group, you may as well really be in it. Working together in earnest is about making the most of the fact that you are a team. Honour your time and efforts by seeing yourself as a full-time member of the group, not just an individual contributor.
Not going in the same direction
To walk in the same direction, a group needs to know where it is going or what it is contributing to (vision) and why (purpose). Spend time on this with your group. This clarity provides a framework and ‘reason to be’ that can rally any given group to work together. Keep in mind that visions need to be compelling and purposes meaningful. People respond to the importance of both.
As the only one who can actually change a person’s behaviour is the person himself/ herself, not the facilitator, change agent, or organization, the role of a project is to support people to practice desired behaviours by enabling them to understand (and where possible also experience) the benefits of the promoted behaviours, recognize and believe in their own capabilities, and address those factors that make practicing desired behaviours difficult. It is always important to recognize and appreciate existing positive behaviour as well as start from using locally available resources.
Respect People’s Right to Choose
Projects must always respect individuals’ right to choose (or not) to adopt a particular behaviour (unless it harms or endangers others) and must consider the risks early adopters may face (e.g. disapproval of their community members, incurring initial financial or time-related costs).
Promote Ethical Change
Only seek to change existing behaviours if such change [20]:
has benefits which are perceived by the targeted community members to outweigh the potential costs/losses caused by changing existing behaviours, customs, and traditions.
are proven to effectively address the problems faced by the targeted animal owning community.
are supported by the key stakeholders (such as civil society representatives, ministries)
Practices to Avoid [20]
Avoid changing a behaviour without trying to understand it first e.g. arriving at a community with a plan to change a given behaviour(s) without trying to first understand why people practice it, why they cannot / do not change it.
Avoid using excessive social pressure or victimizing e.g. coercing instead of motivating people; labelling individuals as a bad animal owners or carers/cruel people when they do not follow certain practices while not reflecting on their ability to do so.
Avoid promising more than the behaviour can deliver e.g. exaggerating the real benefits that a behaviour can deliver or downplaying its costs (required time, effort, disapproval of others)
Avoid Promoting a behaviour with unproved effectiveness e.g. asking people to spend their time, effort, or resources on practicing a behaviour (e.g. certain animal husbandry and management practices) for which there is no strong evidence of effectiveness.
Avoid Creating demand without adequate supply e.g. encouraging people to use animal related resources or services which are hard to access (due to costs, poor availability, distance) without helping to improve access.
Avoid ignoring the already present positive behaviours e.g. introducing new practices without assessing and taking advantage of the existing positive behaviours, beliefs, and know-how
Avoid culturally insensitive interventions.
Promote Equality
It is important understand who discriminated and/or vulnerable groups are and ensure equal opportunities for their participation and representation during the design, planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of such projects to mitigate the perpetuation of their discrimination and/or disadvantage. Community animal welfare intervention projects must ensure they do not operate in ways which are blind or exploitative of different social categorizations such as race, class, and gender, disability etc. Such social categorizations often result in overlapping and interdependent systems and patterns of oppression, discrimination, and disadvantage for these groups, a phenomenon known as intersectionality. This may include ensuring policies and standard operating procedures are in place for gender mainstreaming, promoting equality and diversity and inclusion of traditionally marginalized groups in any engagement activities or communications as needed. At the very minimum it is important to strive to promote equality, and measures may be required to promote equity as a means to achieving equality as needed whenever feasible.
Ensure the Capabilities, Safety, and Security of Community-based Workers
Ensure facilitators and/or community change agents have sufficient core competencies to undertake their work with communities in an ethical, effective, and participatory manner, are provided necessary training and support to undertake their responsibilities as needed, and that proper measures are put in place to ensure their safety, security and well-being while working (e.g. to mitigate safeguarding issues and burn out).
Ensuring the Safety, and Security of Community Members
It is important proper policies and standard operating procedures are in place within your organization and project, as well as sufficient capability within your team, to adopt necessary safeguarding measures to work within the local norms and customs in a way that protects and create an enabling environment for potentially discriminated and vulnerable groups.
Recommended Core Competencies for Community Facilitators of the Community Development Approach
Core competencies recommended to support effective use of this Community Development Approach are provided below:
Facilitation Skills: Experienced in facilitating participatory learning and action (PLA) processes to enable communities to express their understanding or concerns about problems they consider to be important. Able to analyse and reflect on issues, generate motivation to act, and identify possible solutions without leading or injecting your own ideas into community discussions. Knowledgeable of PLA tools and capable of selecting the appropriate tools to support communities in their continuous reflection, learning and action process.
Gender Mainstreaming: Understanding of gender mainstreaming to promote gender equality, as well as intersectionality and implications for vulnerable groups in terms of planning and implementing projects.
Training of Trainers: Understanding of adult learning theory application for effective training: having the skill to make an intervention (training or community discussion) interactive using different methods/activities and the use of participatory tools.
Animal Welfare: good understanding of animal welfare in terms of the five domains and their behavioural equivalents.
Compassionate handling: to handle compassionately makes the experience more positive and welfare-friendly, it improves the experience for animals and humans. Understanding of how to handle animals humanely and to lead by example.
Compassion: capacity to observe and share understanding for another’s distress or pain and have a desire to alleviate or mitigate it.
Excellent communication skills: - active/reflective listening skills - two-way communication, open ended questions - conversations for change: capacity to lead/facilitate discussions to solicit conversations for change and motivate and influence people to change using their own reflections, use values-based communications and be a good negotiator all within an ethical framework
Group formation and strengthening: - experienced with group formation and strengthening processes within the local context e.g. how to set up, legalization and registration of community-based organizations, promoting women’s membership and leadership
Community organizing/mobilization: effective event planning and organization skills (detail oriented).
The following C4A tools and resources may be useful to supporting capacity building related to these core competencies:
Recommended readings and external resources that support this approach and the development of recommended core competencies are provided below:
C4A Readings
Animal Welfare and Communities Learning Module – recommended for gaining an understanding of concepts of the five domains of welfare and how this can be used in raising awareness with communities
Human Behaviour Change Learning Module - recommended for gaining an understanding of behaviour change theory and best practices, the stages of change, and their importance to facilitating behaviour change
Community Engagement and Development Learning Module - recommended for gaining an understanding of the difference between community engagement and community development, and understanding principles and best practices essential to effective community engagement
Extensive Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach - recommended to complement the community development approach by supporting awareness raising to improve knowledge, change perceptions, and/or develop social norms on a broad scale to support adoption of desired behaviours and improved animal welfare. [Note that a campaigns approach is also more than awareness raising].
VIDEO: The Problem with Collective Action – a useful, critique of collective action, covering situations when it is unlikely to work or even to be counterproductive
How can we ensure that animals are getting what they need?
Look at the cow tethered to a fixed location far from feed and water. Select the domains of welfare that do not appear to be met and may be undermining the animal’s welfare.
Select all relevant domains:
A.Nutrition domain B. Health domain C. Environment domain D. Behaviour domain E. Mental State domain
Correct Answers: A, B, C, D, E
Explanation:
Nutrition domain – Nutritional domain appears to be an issue because the animal is tied which restricts their movement thereby preventing them from accessing food and water
Health domain – Health domain appears to be an issue as the animal doesn’t look to be in good health and good body condition. Prolonged lack of access to food and water could potentially result in health issues related to poor body condition.
Environment domain – Environment domain appears to be an issue because animal is tied to a fixed location and unable to seek refuge from the elements
Behaviour domain – Behaviour domain appears to be an issue because the animal is tied and unable to move freely, lay down, or express natural behaviours due to their movement being restricted. The animal is also unable to socialize with other animals.
Mental State domain – Mental domain appears to be an issue because tying prevents the animal from having a positive mental experiences related to having a sense of control and freedom of choice and movement, deriving pleasure from eating/drinking, expressing natural behaviours, and being able to obtain physical comfort.
How can we ensure that animals are getting what they need?
Look at the healthy and bullocks sick with disease kept together. Select the domains of welfare do not appear to be met and may be undermining the animal’s welfare.
Select all relevant domains:
A. Nutrition domain B. Health domain C. Environment domain D. Behaviour domain E. Mental State domain
Correct Answers: A, B, C, E
Explanation:
Nutrition domain – Nutritional domain appears to be an issue because there does not appear to be freely accessible water available to the animals
Health domain – Health domain appears to be an issue because sick animals are kept in close proximity with healthy animals, thereby increasing the likelihood of disease spread, shelter is dirty with uncleaned faeces and lots of flies which can facilitate the spread of parasites.
Environment domain – Environment domain appears to be an issue because animals are kept closely together in a restricted space, and shelter is dirty with faeces which creates smells of excrement and lack of fresh air
Mental State domain – Mental domain appears to be an issue because animals prevented from having a positive mental experiences related to experiencing good health and avoiding disease, olfactory comfort due to being exposed to faecal smell, and may have limited physical comfort due to restricted space.
Behaviour domain does not appear to be an issue because animals are able to socialize together and can move freely.
How can we ensure that animals are getting what they need?
Look at the image of a donkey working while overloaded and exposed to high temperatures and being beaten. Select the domains of welfare do not appear to be met and may be undermining the animal’s welfare.
Select all relevant domains:
A. Nutrition domain B. Health domain C. Environment domain D. Behaviour domain E. Mental State domain
Correct Answers: B, C, D, E
Explanation:
Health domain - appears to be an issue because the animal is overloaded which can cause lameness and injury, and the animal is being beaten with a stick which can cause wounds, and is working hard carrying heavy loads while exposed to high temperatures which can cause heat stress, exhaustion, as well as dehydration if sufficient water is not provided.
Environment domain - appears to be an issue because animal is exposed to high temperatures while being over worked with heavy loads.
Behaviour domain - appears to be an issue because animal is exposed to a threatening circumstance of being beaten, and is unable to move freely while overloaded to escape or rest as needed.
Mental domain - appears to be an issue because the animal is prevented from having a positive mental experiences related to being free from threatening experience and pain, pleasures of freedom of movement and thermal comfort.
However, nutritional domain does not appear to be an issue because animal appears to have a good body condition.
Look at the image of an animal owning household below showing animals returning from work while household members carry out animal husbandry activities while animal health service providers check one of their animals.
Assess which animal needs appear to be met in terms of the 5 domains of welfare, and choose the needs which appear to be met and correctly matched with the appropriate domains of welfare they represent.
A) Nutrition domain: Feed and water is available. B) Health domain: Animals have good body condition; animal is receiving timely preventative health check by animal health service providers; animal is not overloaded and allowed to rest after working hard. C) Environment domain: Animal can move freely; animal can socialize with other animals. D) Behaviour domain: Shelter for animal is clean and keeps the animal protected from elements. E) Mental State domain: animal experiences pleasures of eating and drinking and experiences physical and thermal comfortable and feeling of robust health.
Correct Answers: A, B, E
Explanation:
The 5 domains are not hierarchal and it is not about how many domains are met, but about meeting each 5 in some capacity.
Nutritional Domain: Feed and water is available.
Heath Domain: Animals have good body condition; animal is receiving timely preventative health check by animal health service providers; animal is not overloaded and allowed to rest after working hard.
Mental Domain: animal experiences pleasures of eating and drinking and experiences physical and thermal comfortable and feeling of robust health.
Regarding Environment and Behaviour domains, the images show these are met. However, in the provided choices, the statements are mismatched. The correct statements are as below:
Environment Domain: Shelter for animal is clean and keeps the animal protected from elements.
Behaviour Domain: Animal can move freely; animal can socialize with other animals.
Quiz 2: Relationships Between Animals and People
Refer to the choices provided below and identify which animal care and management practices are matched to either positive or negative animals’ welfare state experiences.
Choose all that apply:
A. Provide your animal with water and quality feed at all times - Positive animal experience. B. Prevent your animal from resting as animals are created to serve people - Neutral. C. Shout at your animal - Negative animal experience. D. Speak quietly and calmly to your animal - Positive animal experience. E. Tie your animal or confine your animal in small space alone - Positive animal experience.
Correct Answers: A, C, and D
Explanation:
Providing your animal water and quality feed; and speaking quietly and calmly to your animal enables your animal to experience positive experiences; whereas on the opposite shouting at your animal, preventing your animal from resting, tethering your animal or confining your animal in small spaces unable to socialize with others results in animals to have negative experiences.
Working animals’ welfare and related productivity is influenced by people’s animal husbandry and management practices. The plus (+) or minus (-) sign within the brackets ( ) in each statement below indicate how people’s animal husbandry and management practices are related to the achievement of the resultant welfare and productivity of their animals indicated after the equals sign (=).
Identify the statements that are correctly matched/correctly stated from the choices provided.
Choose all that apply:
A. working/production animal (-) veterinary check-up = more healthy and productive animal B. working/production animal (-) inhumane handling = more painful, sad and unproductive animal, with higher risk of wounds and infection C. working/production animal (-) nutritious food = more hungry, less healthy and less productive animal D. working/production animal (+) companionship of other animals = more comforted and relaxed animal
Correct Answers: C and D
Explanation:
A. working/production animal (+) veterinary check-up = more healthy and productive animal B. working/production animal (+) inhumane handling = more painful, sad and unproductive animal, with higher risk of wounds and infection C. working/production animal (-) nutritious food = more hungry, less healthy and less productive animal D. working/production animal (+) companionship of other animals = more comforted and relaxed animal E. working/production animal (+) quiet and comfortable lying area = more rested, relaxed and productive animal
Which of the statements are true?
Select all that apply:
A. It is not possible to motivate people to improve their animals’ welfare if such changes do not have perceived benefits to people. B. The stronger the animal – human bond, the more motivated and likely animal owners are to invest in positive animal welfare practices. C. External/environmental factors often influence owners’ circumstances and animals’ experiences. D. When working with communities it is important to help them self-discover/identify how animals contribute to human wellbeing and resilience either directly or indirectly. E. Animals’ welfare needs may change depending on the physical environment only.
Correct Answers: B, C and D
Explanation:
A. It is not possible to motivate people to improve their animals’ welfare if such improvements cannot be linked to perceived benefits to people. FALSE: understanding benefits of animals to people is one potential means to motivate people to care for their animals. However, even if no tangible benefits are perceived from animals or their related welfare improvements, there are other ways to motivate people to improve animal welfare which can be achieved by understanding peoples’ values and beliefs both broadly and in relation to their animals and seek to appeal to those.
B. The stronger the animal – human bond, the more animal owners are motivated and are likely to invest in positive animal welfare practices. So this statement is TRUE.
C. The local environmental and geographic location and socio-economic factors influence owners’ circumstances and animals’ experiences. This statement is TRUE. Owners’ local environment and geographic location and socio-economic factors influence owners’ circumstances. This also affects owners’ potential in fulfilling their animals’ needs too. E.g. access to health services, water points, purchasing power of nutritional feed and quality of equipment used on the animals depending on the species
D. When working with communities it is important to help them self-discover/identify how animals contribute to human wellbeing and resilience either directly or indirectly. This statement is TRUE. Benefits of owning animals contribute to human wellbeing and resilience depending on the species and the socio-cultural and spiritual significance attached to the species in that specific context. These are key elements to explore when working with communities; and it is important to help them identify in their own context on their own the benefits which communities and households derive from owning animals.
E. Animals’ welfare needs may change depending on the physical environment only. This statement is FALSE. Animals’ welfare needs may change depending on the physical environment, on the animals’ age, season, even within a single day. Understanding these varying needs and circumstances help animal owners/carers or users to practice compassionate husbandry and handling practices.
Which of the following statements exemplify how animals may contribute to community members’ well-being?
Select all that apply:
A. Working animals support transport goods communities produce to local markets. B. People who own many animals are considered wealthy and are respected by their neighbours. C. In the case of financial difficulties, animal owners can use their animals as insurance and take out loans against using their animals as collateral or sell them to overcome periods of financial distress. D. Animal ownership creates a cultural sense of identity and belongingness.
Correct Answers: A, B, C and D
Explanation:
A. Working animals such as donkeys support communities by serving as a source of transport for goods and people B. In many societies, owning animals is considered a sign of wealth and provides people to be recognized and respected by local community members and decision makers as they directly and indirectly influence. C. Animal owners can use their animals for emergency cash thereby enabling themselves to withstand or overcome finically difficult seasons/circumstances. D. In addition to the economic and social status benefits of owning animals, large number animal keeping has also a sense of identity building and has cultural and spiritual significance. E.g. for example the Maasai tribes’ sense of identity is strongly linked with cattle keeping.
Quiz 3: Understanding Behaviour
What is NOT a human behaviour?
Select any that apply:
A) Owner does not clean the eyes of the animal everyday B) Animal has bad body condition as a result of untreated wound C) Owner cleans the animals shed on a daily basis D) Family members intend to seek treatment for their sick animal
Correct Answers: B and D
Explanation:
B is incorrect as the statement only reflects the existing animal condition; and not who the doer is and how often and when they need to treat the wound. D is incorrect as it only shows the intention of the Family members to seek treatment for the sick animal.
Identify choices that show the correct correlation between the COM-B model and its sub-components.
Choose all that apply:
A) Motivation – Reflective and Automatic B) Capability – physical capability and psychological capability C) Opportunity – physical opportunity and Social Opportunity D) Motivation – Physical Opportunity and Social Opportunity E) Capability – physical capability and physical opportunity
Correct Answers: A, B and C
Explanation:
Capability comprises of physical capability and psychological capability. Opportunity has also physical and social opportunity as its sub-components, while Motivation has automatic and reflective motivation as its sub-components.
Understanding behaviour in terms of COM-B (capability, motivation, opportunity) drivers is important because it enables you to identify the most appropriate intervention functions/behaviour change techniques?
A) True B) False
Correct Answers: A) True
Explanation:
Undertaking COM-B diagnosis is key to understand the behaviour that needs to change and what kind of strategies/intervention functions can be help in narrowing down the strategies and designing effective intervention to change and sustain the desired behaviour change.
Quiz 4: Relationships Between Animals and People
Which one of the following are represented within the behaviour change wheel (BCW)?
Select all that apply:
A) COM-B B) Intervention Functions C) Trans-Theoretical Model Stages of Behaviour Change D) Policy functions
Correct Answers: A, B and D
Explanation:
A) COM-B mode is represented in BCW as it helps to identify the drivers of behaviour.
B) Intervention Functions is represented in BCW as it identifies strategies for intervention.
C) Policy Categories is represented in BCW as it identifies appropriate policy categories that are available to support behaviour change process.
D) Trans-theoretical Model stages of behaviour change is a separate model that gages where people are in their journey towards behaviour change.
Your project identified that the COM-B components “psychological capability” and “physical opportunity” need to be addressed to support animal owners in adopting the behaviour desired to improve their animals’ welfare.
Refer to the reference table below based on the behaviour change wheel provided to identify the appropriate intervention functions that are recommended to address the changes needed in these COM-B components, and select all answers which include the correct intervention functions as recommended in the table.
A) Psychological capability - training, education, enablement B) Physical opportunity – persuasion, restrictions, environmental restructuring, modelling and enablement C) Physical opportunity – training, restrictions, environmental restructuring and enablement D) Psychological capability – training and enablement
Reference Table
Correct Answers: A and C
Explanation:
Psychological Capability – Training, Education, Enablement are the recommended corresponding potential intervention functions for psychological capability.
Physical Opportunity – Training, Restriction, Environmental Restructuring and Enablement are the recommended potential corresponding intervention functions for physical opportunity.
Quiz 5: Stages of Behaviour Change
Which of these statements about the stages of behaviour change is incorrect?
A) Stages of behaviour change is a linear process B) People in different stages face particular challenges in progressing to the next stage of behaviour change stage C) People’s identity, personal circumstances, and their position within society shapes their journey of behaviour change
Correct Answer: A
Explanation:
Answer “A” is the correct incorrect answer as the stages of behaviour change do not represent a linear process as because there are different variables that can affect how people progress or regress through the stages of behaviour change. Answers “b” B & C are correct as because of people’s position or circumstance or their identity varies which brings out different variables.
Stages of behaviour change in a given community always starts from pre-contemplation stages of change.
A) True B) False
Correct Answer: B (False)
Explanation:
Depending on the animal welfare condition identified and the existing practice within communities, the stages of change for different animal welfare issues might be different. On some issues of animal welfare, communities/individuals may be at pre-contemplation or contemplation or at preparation stages of stages. This is why it is important to assess what stage of change people are in related to an identified animal welfare issue and corresponding causal human behaviour(s).
In the Trans-Theoretical Model of Stages of behaviour change, what is the correct order of stages?
A) Pre-contemplation, relapse, preparation, maintenance B) Pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance C) Preparation, pre-contemplation, contemplation, action, maintenance D) Maintenance, action, pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation E) Pre-contemplation, preparation, contemplation, maintenance
Correct Answer: B
Explanation:
The stages of behaviour change starts from Pre-contemplation whereby people are not aware of an animal welfare issue; which then shifts to contemplation where they start to have the awareness but are not yet determined to start taking actions. After contemplation comes preparation in which people’s decisional balance has shifted to believing change is needed and they are determined to take action and start to make preparations to adopt the new behaviour. This is followed by the action stage where the new behaviour change begins to be performed. The subsequent stage is the maintenance stage where the adopted behaviour is sustained.
Choose the correctly matched stages of behaviour change with the phrase that best describes the stage.
Choose all that apply:
A) Relapse/recurrence – unaware B) Preparation – ready to take action C) Maintenance – confident performing the newly adopted behaviour D) Contemplation – Acknowledge behaviour change is needed E) Action – Learning to adopt the new behaviour F) Pre-contemplation – Reverting back to the old behaviour
Correct Answer: B, C, D and E
Explanation:
People are taking concrete steps and actions to change their behaviour starting from preparation, action and maintenance stages where they make action and implement plans and begin to practice the new behaviour, and continue to practice and sustain it. During Pre-contemplation or Contemplation stages people are either unaware of or are still developing their intention to change their behaviour. The correct descriptors for each stage are as follows:
Pre-contemplation – unaware
Preparation – ready to take action
Maintenance – Confident performing the newly adopted behaviour
Relapse/recurrence – reverting back to the old behaviour
Contemplation – acknowledge behaviour change is needed
Action – learning to adopt the new behaviour
Quiz 6: Behaviour Change Best Practices
Which of the following are unethical practices which should be avoided when working with communities to change their behaviours to improve animal welfare?
Select all that apply:
A) Exaggerating the real benefits that a desired behaviour can deliver or downplaying its costs. B) Seeking to change behaviours that have benefits which are perceived by the targeted community members to outweigh the potential costs/losses caused by changing existing behaviours. C) Seeking to change a behaviour without first seeking to understand it. D) Using excessive social pressure or labelling people as bad or cruel animal owners/carers when they do not follow certain practices.
Correct Answer: A, C and D
Explanation:
A) UNETHICAL: Individuals have a right to make informed choices and it is unethical to oversell the benefits of adopting desired behaviours, and to not be upfront about the costs (e.g., required time, effort, money, and disapproval of others). You should always avoid promising more than the behaviour can deliver e.g., exaggerating the real benefits that a behaviour can deliver or downplaying its costs.
B) ETHICAL: It is only ethical to promote behaviours that have benefits which are perceived by the targeted community members to outweigh the potential costs/losses caused by changing existing behaviours as can waste community members’ time engaging in project activities which are not practical, acceptable, and/or feasible for them to adopt, or may cause people to face unnecessary hardship if adopted. It is also ineffective and therefore wasteful of valuable project resources which could be invested promoting changes that have greater potential to make a difference in the lives and animals and communities who own them.
C) UNETHICAL: Before you can plan to change a behaviour, you must first try to understand why people practice it, why they cannot/ do not change it. They may have very good reasons for their current practices and understanding why they engage in their current practices will help you better understand what kinds of alternative behaviours may be possible to promote, and what capabilities, motivations, and opportunities need to be created to support their adoption.
d) UNETHICAL: Using excessive social pressure or victimizing by labelling individuals as a bad animal owners or carers/cruel people is coercive and unethical and undermines people’s motivation and makes them feel bad about themselves. Instead, it is best to support them to reflect on their ability to follow certain practices and encourage them.
When working with communities to improve animal welfare, the role of the facilitator/change agent is to change community members’ behaviour(s):
A) True B) False
Correct Answer: B (False)
Explanation:
The only one who can change a person’s behaviour is the person himself/ herself, not the facilitator/change agent/organization. The role of a facilitator/change agent is to support people to practice desired behaviours by enabling them to understand (and where possible also experience) the benefits of the promoted behaviours, recognize and believe in their own capabilities, and address those factors that make practicing desired behaviours difficult.
To improve an animals body condition, which of the following behaviours represents an end state behaviour?
Select all that apply?
A) Owners need to grow or purchase nutritious feed for the animals B) Owners provide animals with sufficient feed to meet their nutritional requirement C) Owners are aware of the nutritional requirements of their animals D) Owners engage in monitoring of the body condition of their animals
Correct Answer: B
Explanation
The key to identifying end-state behaviour is to question whether the target audience need to do something else before the desired outcome is achieved. If performing the behaviour described in the statement would result in improving or addressing the desired animal welfare condition, then that statement is considered an end-state behaviour statement.
A) This statement is incorrect as grow or purchase is not end state behaviour as it doesn’t result in improving body condition unless the owners feed their animals with nutritious feed.
B) This statement is correct as it shows the end-state behaviour; which is owners feeding their animals with nutritious feed.
C) This statement is incorrect as awareness on the importance of nutritious feed requirement is not an end state behaviour unless the animals are fed.
D) This statement is incorrect as it is describing a strategy rather than an end-state behaviour.
The following behaviours have been proposed to address issues with animal wounds. Select the behaviour which could be considered a divisible behaviour?
Select all that apply:
A) Guiding without whipping the animal B) Load animals within the load bearing limits appropriate for the animal species C) Use padded equipment to prevent rubbing D) Preventing wounds
Correct Answer: D
Explanation
Preventing wounds is divisible because it can be further divided with different behaviours. E.g. preventing wounds includes all of the above three. Ideally you need to choose which one of the three is the most impactful at addressing welfare issues to address wounds. (Choose the one that is likely to have more impact)
Which of the following behaviour change statements corresponding to an animal welfare issues are well developed/correct?
Select all that apply:
A) Animal Welfare Issue: wounds caused from equipment rubbing. Behaviour Change Statement: Working animal owners use padded equipment whenever animals are working and wearing equipment to prevent wounds from rubbing equipment
B) Animal Welfare Issue: Very poor body condition/underweight. Behaviour Change Statement: Owners grow sufficient feed to meet their animals’ nutritional requirements for feeding three times per day
C) Animal Welfare Issue: Animal illness from preventable disease. Behaviour Change Statement: Owners take preventative care to promote their animals welfare.
D) Animal Welfare Issue: Animal illness from preventable disease. Behaviour Change Statement: Women seek the services of qualified animal health service providers to vaccinate their animals on a yearly basis to prevent disease.
Correct Answer: A and D
Explanation:
Whenever an animal welfare issue arises, it is important to then specify them in terms of human behaviour and the desired end state behaviour, meaning the behaviour that actually produces the desired outcome. A behaviour change statement needs to specify Who needs to do the behaviour, What they need to do differently, and How they need to do it including any relevant details such as when, where, with whom and how frequently to do the behaviour. Thus, answers “A” and “D” are correct statements, while “B” and “C” are incorrect because they don’t show an end state behaviour. In addition, “C” is incorrect as it doesn’t specify who needs to do what differently and how often.
Read the following scenario, and then select the statements that follow which are FALSE.
Due to a tight project deadline, project staff did not have a lot of time to work with communities and found it challenging to organize meetings with them. After conducting educational activities to raise awareness about animal welfare, staff worked with members of the community to identify their priority animal welfare issues and then began working with communities to change their behaviours to new, alternative behaviours the project recommended they adopt to address animal welfare issues.
A) This approach is ethical because project staff have the greatest expertise in animal welfare and are more likely to recommend the most appropriate solution.
B) This approach is unethical because the project team did not spend the time to understand current behaviours/practices before beginning to promote solutions.
C) This is a reasonable workaround given the situation faced by project staff.
Correct Answer: A and C
Explanation:
A) FALSE: Communities have the best understanding of what is feasible and appropriate given their local context and should always be engaged to ensure any new behaviour or practices being promoted are locally appropriate. It is ethical to ensure communities have a say in the decisions which affect their lives, and this also helps to promote their self-efficacy and empowerment. Project staff’s subject matter expertise on solutions to animal welfare issues is most appropriately offered when communities ask for support in identifying solutions because they lack capacity to do so themselves. Alternatively, it can be appropriate to recommend solutions if communities’ proposed solutions are likely to cause further harm to animals, the environment, or people.
B) TRUE: It is ethical to spend time understanding communities’ current behaviours/practices before beginning to promote solutions because they may have good reasons for undertaking their current practices, and why they may or may not be able to adopt desired changes, and will help ensure projects understand what capabilities, motivations, and opportunities may be needed for change to be possible and ensure projects are designed effectively and efficiently to address them.
C) FALSE: This is not a reasonable workaround as prescribed solutions are much less effective and unlikely to be owned or sustained by communities, may not be appropriate for the local context, and may waste valuable time and resources both project and participating communities. Implementing organizations need to ensure they build in sufficient time when planning projects to properly engage communities in the identification of any behaviours or practices a project may seek to promote.
Quiz 7: Key Concepts in Community Engagement and Development
Which of following key concepts does NOT represent an important consideration within Community Engagement and Community Development processes?
Select all that apply:
A) Community Participation B) Diversity and Inclusion C) Gender D) Comparison E) Intersectionality F) Equality and Equity G) Gender Mainstreaming
Correct Answer: D
Explanation:
'D' - Comparison is not a key concept which is important to consider within community engagement and development processes. Rationales for why answers a, b, c, e, f, and g are all important considerations within community engagement and development processes are explained below:
A) Community Participation: is an essential element of any community engagement or development process and it is important to understand what the goal of community participation is as this can determine how best to design community engagement and development processes to achieve the desired extent of community participation and influence over planning and decision making processes.
B) Diversity and Inclusion: diverse representation in participation amongst different groups within community engagement and development processes is important; however is not sufficient to enabling them to influence and inform decision making processes. Such processes should also therefore aim to promote their inclusion by ensuring their diverse perspectives, knowledge, skills, and lived experiences are also valued and integrated.
C) Gender: socially and culturally constructed norms and expectations of men and women can impact their access and availability of resources and services, decision making power, and ability to influence and participate between the sexes, making gender an important consideration within community engagement and development processes.
E) Intersectionality: Intersectionality refers to the interconnected nature of social categorizations as they apply to a given individual or group such as race, class, and gender amongst others, which act to create overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage. To ensure community engagement and development processes do not reinforce inequalities and are designed to effectively support different groups’ equal participation and ability to influence and benefit from such processes, it is useful to use an intersectional to inform the design and implementation of community engagement and development processes.
F) Equality and Equity: Equality refers to each individual or group of people having the same resources or opportunities and being treated the same regardless of their differences. Equity is a means for achieving equality by seeking to understand the inequalities that exist and working to address them so that all groups have what they need to have equal opportunities. The concept recognizes that different groups have different needs and social power and that these differences can make it more challenging for some groups to achieve the same goals with the same effort.
G) Gender mainstreaming: It involves ensuring that gendered analysis, gender perspectives, and attention to the goal of gender equality are central to any planned actions such as project activities, programmes, policies, and legislation so that inequality is not perpetuated.
Which among the following is (are) the participation goal(s) associated with community engagement and development processes?
Tick all that apply:
A) Consulting B) Empowering C) Informing D) Collaborating E) Involving
Correct Answer: A, B, D and E
Explanation:
A, B, D, and E - they involve two-way communication with the community. However, C) Informing is the only participation goal which is not associated with community engagement and development processes. This is because informing involves only one-way communication, where communities are provided with information.
Quiz 8: Core Values and Principles of Community Engagement and Development Processes
Which of the following is NOT a key Similarities between Community Engagement and Development Processes?
Select which one applies:
A) Both seeks community participation to inform identification of issues and solutions, project planning and implementation. B) Both requires strong community facilitation skills as they heavily rely on participatory learning and action methods. C) Both ensure engagement of communities is an outcome (rather than a process) e.g., to build relationships, build capacity, provide information. D) Both employ best practices informed by a set of shared core values and principles.
Correct Answer: D
Explanation:
D) - A strong community facilitation skills as and requirement for participatory learning and action methods is a unique characteristic to the Community development approach.
Which of the following is (are) the core values and principles shared by the Community Engagement and Community Development processes?
Tick all that apply:
A) Promote Community Participation and Two-Way Communication B) Self-Efficacy C) Self-determination and Ownership D) Promote Equality, Inclusiveness, and diversity E) Do No Harm
Correct Answer: All
Explanation:
All are principles and values shared between CE and CD and are interdependent and reinforcing of one another and it is therefore recommended they be promoted together to the greatest extent feasible for achievement of optimal outcomes.
Quiz 9: Approaches for Working with Communities
On the spectrum of community participation, what levels of participation are typically supported by each of the following approaches to working with communities?
Select all that apply:
A) Community Development Approach:- Empower B) Community Engagement Approach: Inform, Consult, Involve, Collaborate, Empower C) Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach: Inform, Consult, Involve, Collaborate, Empower D) Community Engagement Approach:- Consult, Involve, Collaborate
Correct Answer: A and D
Explanations:
Empower: The CD approach supports community empowerment through reliance on PLA processes and tools that enable community members to decide where they are now, where they want to go, and make a plan to reach these goals, based on self-reliance and sharing of power. It may also support collaboration when knowledgeable experts support communities to identify locally appropriate solutions for improving the welfare of their animals which do no harm.
Consult, Involve, Collaborate: The level of participation supported by the CE approach can vary from consult, to involve or collaborate depending on how the approach is implemented. It can support collaboration when it supports communities to identify solutions for achieving desired changes through a collaborative process of inquiry and reflection. Alternatively it may simply involve them in the identification of these issues and solutions, or the implementing organization may set the animal welfare and behaviour change priorities and simply consult them to obtain information to inform their planning and implementation of interventions.
Consult, Involve: The level of participation supported by the SOC approach can vary from consult to involve. For example, it may consult with communities to gather feedback or information to inform outreach messages which reflect the implementing organizations priorities. Alternatively, it could go a step further and involve them in the identification of issues and/or solutions to be promoted, as well as support their participation in implementing outreach activities and delivering communications e.g. community theatre, radio shows etc.
Which of the following is NOT a key Consideration when selecting intensive community development approach?
Select all that apply:
A) Communities can be reached to meet with them directly. B) Community members are willing and able to meet regularly, and there is sufficient social cohesion/trust to work together for collective action (e.g. not geographically spread, non-migratory) C) Requires a high level of facilitation skills to support the participatory learning and action process. D) Requires highest investment of support/time to implement (3-5 years) E) Recommended approach when working with highly vulnerable people and animals (animal at high risk of poor welfare) F) Due to higher support investment, and targeted engagement of groups - may not permit broad reach (depends on capacity of resources of implementing organization) G) Targets large amounts of people/broad reach. H) Recommended approach for animals at low -moderate risk of poor welfare and amongst populations whose livelihoods are not highly vulnerable.
Correct Answer: G and H
Explanation:
G) is a consideration for selecting Extensive Societal Outreach and Campaigns while H) is a consideration for selecting Semi-Intensive Community Engagement.
Select the COM-B sub-components/behavioural drivers approaches which are BEST addressed by Community Development Approach for working with communities.
Choose any that apply:
A) Psychological Capability and Physical Capability B) Social Opportunity and Physical Opportunity C) Reflective Motivation and Automatic Motivation D) All are correct responses
Correct Answer: D
Explanation
CD Approach - Psychological Capability, Physical Capability, Social Opportunity, Physical Opportunity, Reflective Motivation, and Automatic Motivation: The CD approach incorporates capacity building related to knowledge and skills. Social opportunity can be addressed through peer-to-peer support, and peer pressure within community groups as well as modelling by community groups supporting creation of social norms. Collective action can help create physical opportunities for community members which would otherwise not be possible operating solely as individuals. Also, the collective voice and empowerment of groups and enable them to better advocate for their needs. Reflective motivation can be addressed through the use of PLA tools which promote reflection and learning reflect.
Select the COM-B sub-components/behavioural drivers approaches which are BEST addressed by Societal Outreach and Campaign approach for working with communities.
Choose any that apply:
A) Psychological Capability and Physical Capability B) Social Opportunity and Physical Opportunity C) Reflective Motivation, Social Opportunity, and psychological capability D) Physical capability, physical opportunity, automatic motivation
Correct Answer: C
Explanation
Societal Outreach and Campaigns Approach - Psychological Capability, Social Opportunity, and Reflective Motivation: The SOC approach addresses psychological capability in terms of raising awareness and/or demonstrating how to implement new skills. Social opportunity can be addressed when this approach is used to help support the creation of new social norms at the societal level using influential messengers and effective communication to normalize desired changes. The SOC approach also supports reflective motivation by using outreach and communication to:
Induce positive or negative feelings or stimulate action. - Create expectation of reward. - Create expectations of punishment or costs as relevant/available.
Select the COM-B sub-components/behavioural drivers approaches which are BEST addressed by Community Engagement approach for working with communities.
Choose any that apply:
A) Psychological Capability, Physical Capability, and Social Opportunity B) Social Opportunity and Physical Opportunity C) Reflective Motivation, Automatic Motivation, Social opportunity D) Reflective Motivation, Automatic Motivation, Physical opportunity
Correct Answer: A and C
Explanation
Community Engagement Approach - Psychological Capability, Physical Capability, Social Opportunity, Reflective Motivation, and Automatic Motivation: In the CE approach community change agents work to build target community members knowledge and skills through education and training activities. Social opportunity may be addressed through the creation of social norms at the community level because of peer-to-peer support and/or peer pressure and modelling by community change agents and target peers. Reflective motivation can be addressed by facilitating conversations for change and the reflection and learning processes built into the approach. Automatic motivation may also be addressed when community change agents support target peers to develop new habits, create cues for new behaviours, and support individuals to address potential triggers.
Choose the correlation of an approach for working with communities that reflects the likelihood it will result in lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvements.
Choose all that apply:
A) Societal outreach and campaigns approach has the highest likelihood in resulting lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvement. B) Community engagement approach has a moderate to high likelihood of resulting in lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvement. C) Community development approach has the highest likelihood of lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvement. D) Societal outreach and campaigns approach has the lowest likelihood of resulting in lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvement.
Correct Answer: B, C and D
Explanation:
Highest Likelihood - CD Approach: the CD approach has the highest likelihood of resulting in lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvements because it builds community members’ capacity to support one another and work together to take collective action, thereby enabling them to be much more self-reliant, particularly where formalized community groups are formed, and capacity built to ensure their lasting operation.
Moderate – High Likelihood - CE Approach: The CE approach as a moderate to high likelihood of success, with higher being more likely when communities rather than the implementing organization determine animal welfare and related behaviour change priorities. The success of this approach is also highly dependent on the capacity of the CE agents, and the provision of sufficient capacity building training for community change agents if they are used. Likelihood of achieving and sustaining results may also be hindered by limitations faced in the external environment as this approach does not explicitly address barriers to change related to physical opportunity (e.g., lack of financial or natural resources, availability of quality animal health services), and some barriers related to social opportunity which operate at a societal rather than community level e.g., cultural or gender norms.
Low Likelihood - SOC Approach: The SOC approach has the lowest likelihood of resulting in lasting behaviour change and animal welfare improvements as effective messaging and outreach is only capable of supporting people’s progress through a limited number of the stages of behaviour change.
![Figure 26: The spectrum of community participation and its relationship to the three C4A approaches for working with communities [44]](http://communitiesforanimals.thebrooke.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/A19-Spectrum-Complete.png)
![Figure 28: Gender Equality Continuum with Examples from Animal Welfare Improvement Projects [56]](http://communitiesforanimals.thebrooke.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/A20-Gender-Complete.png)
![Fig 14a: Process of Group Formation
(Adapted from [70, 111])](http://communitiesforanimals.thebrooke.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/image-3.png)
