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Decreasing Childhood Obesity through an Effort to Decrease Screen Time - Evaluation
Amber France
Concordia University
Decreasing Childhood Obesity through an Effort to Decrease Screen Time – Evaluation
Introduction
Evaluation is an important piece of a social marketing campaign (Resnick & Siegel, 2013). Evaluation can support organization priorities and inform organizations where program improvements are needed (CDC, n.d.). Evaluation is an ongoing process that includes both process and outcome evaluation measures. Evaluation should be built into the planning process of a social marketing campaign in order to effectively evaluate the program (Oxford Health Alliance Programme, 2014).
Objectives for Evaluation
Evaluation components should be based on the programs, or campaigns, objectives (Oxford Health Alliance Programme, 2014). The objectives of the campaign (all with a one year time frame) are:
1. To decrease screen time to less than 2 hours per day by increasing the opportunities for physical activity, among children ages 2-4 enrolled in the Fit Families Program.
2. To increase the amount of physical activity per day, among children ages 2-4 enrolled in the Fit Families Program, by offering resources to decrease barriers to physical activity opportunities.
3. To increase parental knowledge and awareness of role modeling related to screen time and physical activity, as well as the effects of parental behaviors on children’s health behaviors.
Outcome Evaluation
Outcome evaluation is typically conducted after the program is finished, but can also be conducted periodically throughout the programs entirety (Resnick & Siegel, 2013). Outcome evaluation shows whether not the program had the effect on the target population that it was intended to. For this campaign, outcome evaluation will be done annually, because participants in the Fit Families Program have to re-enroll every year. Each year there will be some new participants enrolling into the program and some of the target audience will choose not to re-enroll or graduate from the program. Since this is an ongoing program, a logic model will be developed. A logic model is designed to allow planners to diagram the way in which a program will work (Resnick & Siegel, 2013). The logic model will contain program inputs, activities, and anticipated outcomes and long-term goals. The long-term goal of this campaign is to decrease childhood obesity among the children enrolled in the Fit Families Program. Annually, childhood obesity rates among this population will be evaluated as part of the outcome evaluation.
Outcome evaluation that will be conducted for this campaign will be centered on the objectives. Outcome evaluation will look at whether or not the objectives were met, improvements that were made to the program, how the target audience reacted to the campaign, any unintended consequences resulting from the campaign, and whether or not this is an effective campaign and good use of resources (Resnick & Siegel, 2013). Specifically for this campaign, the outcome evaluation will measure whether or not the percentage of children enrolled in the Fit Families Program watching less than 2 hours of screen time increased, whether or not there is an increase in physical activity among children enrolled in the Fit Families Program, and whether or not there is an increase in parental knowledge and awareness of role modeling and the effect of their behavior’s on their child’s behavior choices. All of these measures will determine whether or not the program is effective. These measurements will be done through a pre-post design. Survey’s will be conducted with each participating family prior to the start of the campaign and then again at one year after initially enrolling into the program. If the participant re-enrolls into the Fit Families Program, a survey will still be conducted annually to show outcomes of the previous year and progress made. The survey will include questions regarding the number of hours the child spends with screen time per day, the number of hour the parents spend with screen time per day, the number of hours the child engages in physical activity per day and examples of the types of physical activity, the number of hours the parents engage in physical activity per day and examples of the types of physical activity, the number of hours the family spends engaging in screen time and physical activity together, and the importance of physical activity and limitation of screen time to the parent regarding the children and themselves.
Process Evaluation
In order to determine specifics of why the outcome evaluation results occurred, process evaluation will be conducted. Process evaluation is used to measure message delivery, reception of the materials by the target audience, and to make adjustments throughout implementation to increase program effectiveness (Resnick & Siegel, 2013). Process evaluation is done throughout the program and helps specify why outcome evaluation resulted the way that it did.
The process evaluation that will be done for this campaign will pertain to the message framing and the goods and services provided by the campaign to determine effectiveness of these pieces to contributing to the ultimate goal of the campaign. The messaging of the campaign will be framed towards parents of the children enrolled in the Fit Families program around the core values of parenting: freedom, pride, happiness, and love. Each month when there is contact with the health coach, the health coach will ask the participant a brief survey regarding the campaign and some of the questions will be how they got their information for the campaign, why they feel decreasing screen time is important for their children, and if they feel decreasing screen time is also important for them as the parent. These questions will help gauge whether not the media sources are effective and if the message is clear and hitting on their core values. Messaging efforts will be tweaked to better meet participant needs, if necessary.
The good that will be provided for this campaign is a free 6 month membership to the YMCA with an additional 6 month membership that is paid up to 75% of the rate as long as stipulations are met in the first 6 months. This membership includes parent-child exercise programs, as well as individual adult and child programs, and the ability for the child to participate in YMCA sports teams and lessons. All of these services come with the stipulation that the YMCA must be frequented by the family at least 2 days out of the week. Process evaluation will be conducted at 7 months to determine whether or a not free 6 month membership was effective at getting the family to purchase an additional 6 months and whether or not the family frequented the YMCA at least 2 days a week. This evaluation not only shows whether or not the family is utilizing the YMCA, but whether or not the parents are showing an increased awareness of role modeling positive behavior by engaging in physical activity as a family.
Health coaching through the Fit Families program will also be provided. Parents will receive monthly contact by their health coach and each month a new goal will be set around decreasing screen time and increasing physical activity. When goals are met incentives will be given to help maintain goals. For example, if the goal is to play baseball with their child 2 days out of the week then a bat and ball incentive will be given. The actionable information will be provided during the monthly health coaching session. Guidance on resources in the community and the benefits of engaging the whole family in physical activity will be available to the parents. During the health coaching session, evaluation of progress on goals and discussion on barriers to meeting goals will be done as part of the process evaluation. The participant will also receive a survey at 6 months that will ask similar questions to the outcome evaluation survey but ask for specifics on their satisfaction with the health coaching and resources available to help meet their goals.
Summary
Both process and outcome evaluation is needed in order to ensure this campaign is effectively creating behavior change. Process and outcome evaluation measures are determined during the planning process. Since this campaign is an ongoing effort, the process of how evaluation is performed will be repeated annually.
References
CDC. (n.d.). A framework for program evaluation. Retrieved from www.cdc.gov/eval/framework/index.htm
Oxford Health Alliance Programme. (2014). Evaluation. Retrieved from http://www.oxha.org/cih_manual/index.php/introduction-evaluation
Resnick, E. A. & Siegel, M. (2013).Marketing public health: Strategies to promote social change(3rd ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones and Bartlett Learning.