Conducting a Participatory Situation Analysis of.pdf - Global HIV ...

• One team of two interviewers can complete 6 to 8
interviews per day for a survey with caregivers.
• One team of two interviewers can complete 5 to 7
interviews per day for surveys with children and
young people.
• Focus group facilitator can hold 2 to 3 focus group
discussions (FGDs) per day.
• Using the in-depth interview tools in this Guide,
each interview averages about 1.5 hours. Need to factor
in travel time and waiting time to see the person.
• Focus group facilitation and in-depth interviewing
requirements must be determined for each location.
• Personnel are needed to arrange in-depth interview
times and locations as well as to recruit focus group
participants. Community partners should be able to
assist with this before starting the fieldwork and
make confirmations during the field-level training.
Identifying Interviewers and Moderators
Interviewers must be able to interview a range of stakeholders,
from officials at the local and national levels to
children and adolescents. This is probably the single
most important aspect of this activity. The interviewers
also must be skilled at establishing a rapport with caregivers
or heads of households whose living conditions are
extremely stressed. Identifying suitable interviewers is not
easy, and may require creative approaches, including considering
alternative sources of qualified persons, such as
professional groups of social workers or teachers.
Desired qualities of an interviewer include:
• Strong interviewing skills and experience conducting
interviews
• Good listening and writing skills
• Empathetic and non-judgmental attitude toward
HIV-infected persons and/or OVC
• Experience with and knowledge of HIV/AIDSaffected
households
• Experience interviewing individuals with depression,
anger, or other psychological problems
• Language skills appropriate for the data collection
sites
The non-skills-based qualities of interviewers (e.g., ethnicity,
religion, social class, and caste social status) can
affect how respondents reply and what they will or will
not say. For example, if a respondent believes (correctly
or incorrectly) that an interviewer is a “government official”
or an “official medical person,” the respondent may
not be comfortable telling the interviewer certain information.
For FGDs, the depth and quality of the information
depends on the competence of the moderators conducting
and documenting group discussions. The interviewer
qualities noted above also apply to focus group moderators.
Focus group moderators should have the ability to
put people at ease, probe or ask follow-up questions, and
establish group conversational dynamics. Establishing
group conversational dynamics is distinctly different
from one-on-one interviewing, and interviewers trained
in quantitative approaches may not have the skills needed
to facilitate focus group discussions.
A good focus group discussion moderator should be
able to:
• Stimulate discussion among group members.
• Encourage participants to express divergent opinions.
• Draw out reluctant participants and control overly
talkative persons.
• Keep discussion moving and focused on central
themes.
• Remain non-critical and avoid giving “expert” opinions
or asking leading questions.
• Effectively read nonverbal responses.
• Verbally and nonverbally show genuine interest in
the discussion.
A practical strategy for building a team of interviewers
and moderators is to select individuals who together have
as many as possible of the essential characteristics needed
to interview individuals and groups. It may be necessary
to consider persons who have never worked with children
or in areas affected by HIV/AIDS but who have
experience in interviewing and moderating techniques.
The Technical Lead may consider hiring people from the
target communities as interviewers, but target group
membership should not be emphasized over interviewer
characteristics and skills. Also, confidentiality issues may
limit the hiring of community members for the data collection
process.
Identifying Psychosocial Support Persons
The sensitive nature of topics about the emotional wellbeing
of children requires that a trained PSSP accompany
each interviewer and be available throughout FGDs.
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Guidelines and Tools