Culture Counts: A Guide to Best Practices for Developing Health Promotion Initiative in Mental Health and Substance Use with
Ethnocultural Communities
In Chapter 3 - Gather and analyze information
On this page:
There are many different ways to gather information for your health promotion initiative. Try to use a few and involve community
members as much as possible. Here are some suggestions:
What: reading reports of what others have done on the same problem you intend to work on and/or the ethnocultural community you
plan to work with.
Use for:
- getting background information about the community you will be working with
- getting some ideas about what might or might not work for your project
How: You can do the search of the literature yourself if you are knowledgeable about using databases or have time to learn. If
you are pressed for time or do not have access to specialized databases, it might be more efficient to have a reference librarian
do the literature search for you. Collect a wide range of relevant journal articles, conference papers, research reports,
and so on. Review them and summarize findings that are relevant to the problem and or the ethnocultural community you are
working with.
Pros:
- may help you and your partners avoid others’ missteps
- can give you background information on traditions in different ethnocultural communities.
Cons:
- Information based on experiences elsewhere may not apply to the community you will be working with. Ethnocultural communities
in Canada do not necessarily compare with corresponding communities in other countries; there can even be regional differences
within a country. Differences can come from national origin, migration experiences, social class, how long the community has
been established and the cultural influences of the host country or region.
- There may not be much recent research or literature about the community.
“Sometimes mainstream organizations seem to base their knowledge of our community on what they have read in books, and they
end up with stereotypes or information that is out of date and out of context. For instance, arranged marriages are no longer
the rule in our community and are getting less favoured—people date and meet over the Internet. Our community is changing
very rapidly.”
--Naga Ramalingam, SACEM |
To learn more about literature reviews:
What: lists of questions used to gather information about people’s behaviour, knowledge, opinions and feelings.
Use for:
- needs assessment
- gathering baseline data for an outcome evaluation and forming initiative goals
- process evaluation (e.g., find out if community members feel the initiative is working)
- any time you need information from larger groups of people.
How: Surveys are usually printed, although sometimes someone reads the questions aloud and writes down the answers for another
person. There are different ways to do them:
- through the mail
- through e-mail
- through a web site (e.g., SurveyMonkey)
- over the telephone
- in person.
Pros:
- can reach large numbers of people
- can be done quickly
- provides a written record of responses
- easy to collect and analyze results.
Cons:
- allow little or no flexibility in responses
- can be costly
- may need some knowledge of statistic methods
- written surveys may be difficult where there are differences in language and reading abilities; in ethnocultural communities,
having people read the surveys to respondents and fill in their responses for them may produce the best results.
“In our experience, telephone interviews or surveys do not work very well. People are distracted, or they don't trust the
person they are talking to, or other people in the home want to know why they're on the phone so long. Some people just function
better when talking to someone face to face.”
--Baldev Mutta, Punjabi Community Health Centre |
To learn more about surveys and questionnaires:
What: talking to people one at a time about an issue.
Use for:
- getting information from key informants (well known community members who play a leadership role in some sector)
- evaluating effectiveness of initiative materials, activities and processes
- gathering qualitative information.
How:
- in person with one interviewer or one interviewer plus second person to write down responses
- over the telephone
- by mail or e-mail (with written responses)
Pros:
- in person, interviewer can observe non-verbal responses
- may be easier for people with limited literacy than other methods
- flexible.
Cons:
- quality of results depends on skill of interviewers
- time-consuming, costly to interview large numbers
- interviewers may need training
- results may be affected by interviewers’ biases or interviewees’ agendas
“We wanted to learn about the issues of older adults in our community, but most of them live with their children; if we interviewed
them in their homes, they might not be as open about difficult issues, such as elder abuse. To get past this problem, we had
trained interviewers ride a popular bus route and strike up conversations with seniors they met on the bus. Those who agreed
to be interviewed received a bus ticket for their participation.”
--Baldev Mutta, Punjabi Community Health Centre |
To learn more about interviews:
What: discussions about a certain topic among small groups led by a trained moderator/facilitator
Use for:
- needs assessment
- gathering opinions
- gathering qualitative information.
How:
- recruit a wide range of key informants and members of the community or intended audience
- train facilitators and note-takers if necessary
- put together a facilitation/note-taking guide
- run separate groups for men and women, different age groups, when appropriate
- limit group size to six to ten participants
- provide food, childcare, reimbursement for transportation costs or, where appropriate, honoraria to participants.
“Offering food is always a good way to attract people to take part in focus groups in the Sri Lankan community!” --Dr. Krishanthy Shu, Vasantham (Tamil Seniors Wellness Centre) |
Pros:
- participants may be more open and honest than in one-to-one interviews
- group setting may spark unexpected responses
- can result in a wider range of information.
Cons:
- participants may be shy about speaking in groups
- time-consuming to organize (recruiting participants, facilitators; training facilitators)
- may require training facilitators
- results difficult to collect, analyze.
“It is a challenge to get a wide range of people to take part in focus groups. You tend to get people who are interested in
the issue and have a certain amount of formal education. Others may not be interested in it, feel intimidated by it or do
not have time to take part in it.”
--Naga Ramalingam, SACEM |
To learn more about running focus groups:
What: a discussion among a large group of community members led by a facilitator/moderator about issues of concern.
Use for:
- needs assessment
- goal-setting
- problem-solving
- promoting an initiative
- encouraging further community participation in the development and running of an initiative.
How:
- arrange for time, place for meeting that is most convenient to the widest range of community members to attend
- promote the meeting well ahead of time
- have skilled facilitator from partner agency or other respected person from the community run the meeting.
Pros:
- gives opportunity to gather opinions, ideas from a wide range of community members
- gets community members involved in the initiative early on
- creates interest in the initiative and community health issues in general.
Cons:
- limited time to discuss issues
- requires skilled, trusted facilitator
- facilitators may need to be trained
- some participants may be shy about speaking in front of large group.
To learn more about running community meetings:
What: collecting and analyzing data related to issues of concern from records of government agencies and other sources of information
available to the public.
Use for:
- needs assessment
- comparisons with other communities
- developing a community profile—e.g., demographics, services available or needed.
How:
- Search public databases available on the internet.
- Ask a reference librarian or archivist to do a search for you.
Pros:
- can help avoid repeating work someone has already done
- can save time
- can provide data that is hard to get by other means
- can provide “hard facts and figures” to support funding proposals
Cons:
- may need special searching skills
- results may not apply to the community you are working with.
Tip: As well as numerical data, archives may also provide historical photos and documents that can help increase understanding
of a community and support a health promotion initiative.
To learn more about finding statistics:
Also see organizations related to specific subjects, such as the Canadian Cancer Society.
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