In Ghana: We experiment, we write.

The year 2022 was a busy one for Ghana Health Service and the UNICEF Ghana Social and Behavior Change (SBC) team. In addition to contributing a chapter to the “SBC Intro Guide” on the use of Behavioural Insights in Ghana (see page 8), they also developed key technical partnerships and collaborated on several essays and journal articles.

At the very moment that UNICEF was expanding it’s social change toolkit in 2022, launching the Behavioral Insights Research and Design Lab (BIRD-Lab), and issuing new program guidance on Social and Behavior Change, the Ghana Health Service was already pioneering the use of new social change approaches. Together with partners UNICEF Ghana, the Behavioral Insights Team, and Common Thread, who blend Human Centered Design and Behavioural Insights under the umbrella “Behavioural Design,” the Ghana Health Service prototyped new ways to increase access to vaccination services and are now exploring how to make health services more adolescent friendly (see “journey map” reference below).

During a year of exploration and experimentation with new Social and Behavior Change approaches, the UNICEF team and Ghana Health Service managed to document their work and also publish in peer-reviewed journals. It can be difficult for practitioners to find time to write, which makes the list of outputs below noteworthy:

1. Journal article 1, on the importance of trust when promoting vaccination (Archives of Public Health, 2022);
2. Journal article 2, on using social listening data to address misinformation about COVID and COVID vaccines (Infodemiology, 2022);
3. Essay on “wayfinding” in Kumasi Ghana, a use of rapid prototyping to identify the best way to help people find and access available vaccines; and:
4. A two-page practical tool for community leaders, with key actions and information, based on Behavioural Science principles like “make it easy,” and “appeal to altruism.”

If words like “wayfinding” and “journey mapping” (see below) are new to you, the collaborative work of UNICEF Ghana with Ghana Health Service can help you discover and better understand these new tools. In that spirit, sharing three final resources: 1) Draft wayfinding prototypes (Kumasi Ghana); and 2) Draft formative research and journey maps, adolescent health in Ghana (work in progress, stay tuned for more on this); 3) A full list of tools, essays and articles shared with us by UNICEF Ghana in 2022 (includes some of the items listed above).

We look forward to continue learning from our colleagues in Ghana as they explore and document new ways of promoting health services in 2023. For now, to the teams in Accra and Kumasi, we say: “Hats off to you for trying new approaches and finding time to write!”

Journey map for adolescent girls in Ghana seeking health services (see link, page 6).

Do you have suggestions for this essay or ideas for a new essay? Please share in our “Basket of feedback and good ideas.” Social and Behavior Change Team, UNICEF West and Central Africa Regional Office/WCARO)

For more short essays: See Exchange №1, Exchange №2, and Exchange №3