We Create Change

The shows PCI-Media Impact develops portray people’s everyday lives. Each dramatizes the problems people struggle with, and models functional strategies and solutions to them.

This broadcast approach succeeds because it motivates people to make personal choices that improve their lives. Field tests of the impact in diverse cultural milieus verify its power to create healthier lifestyles.

PCI-Media Impact provides highly creative and effective vehicle for ameliorating some of the most urgent global problems – gender equality, in social, health and educational life, and the spreading AIDS epidemic…

Professor Albert Bandura
Stanford University

Building Community Schools
INDIA - Tinka Tinka Sukh (Happiness Lies in Small Things)

Tinka Tinka Sukh, a radio drama broadcast with a budget of only $40,000, made a big impact across India. This show probably had the largest regular listenership for any radio drama worldwide. Striking examples of the broadcast’s power came from listeners in the village of Lutsaan; for example, where a village group was formed to end dowry-giving and a cooperative was set up to start a school, both following examples that were shown in the story.

Cleaning the Environment
GUATEMALA – Corazon del Cielo y Corazon del la Tierra (Heart of the Sky, Heart of the Earth)

A student listener reports how the Mayan drama changed her life and her community: “Listening to the radio drama made me realize that there was a lot of trash in my classroom, so I suggested to my classmates that we pick it up. I wasn’t taken seriously, and they all started to laugh. (But) Our classmates decided to buy a trashcan. I had to do this in my house as well, not to have a breeding ground for flies that would make us all sick. These radio dramas have motivated us to ourselves from diseases and to take care of our environment.“

Awareness of Safe Sex Practices
HONDURAS - Doble Sentido (Double Meaning): A Program about Sex

In a pre-broadcast survey, 40% of respondents could not list a form of sexual violence. In the post-broadcast survey, this was reduced to only 9% of listeners not being able to list a form of sexual violence. Similarly, as a result of the broadcast, a survey of the community indicated that the number of people who could not name a HIV/AIDS prevention method had fallen from 20% to 9%.

Improving Health Care
INDIA - Taru

The health messages which were part of the radio show Taru were broadcast into the Indian state of Bihar which has a population exceeding over 100 million people. A study by researchers at Ohio University showed Taru achieved impressive results in its target communities. Here is some of the reported impact this program had:

• Local clinics experienced dramatic increases in the sales of condoms, oral contraceptives and pregnancy testing devices, with increases reported in the 200% to 600% range during the shows months.

• After the 1-year broadcast period survey respondents held significantly stronger gender equality beliefs, improved perceptions of the quality of family planning services, better knowledge about where to go to get family planning services, awareness of clinics, use of oral contraceptive), and use of modern family planning methods (with the exception of vasectomy).

Taking Control of One’s Life
TANZANIA - Twende na Wakati (Let’s Go With the Times)

An evaluation of this radio serial drama in Tanzania indicated the drama had significant and measurable effects on listeners’ adoption of HIV/AIDS prevention and family planning methods. These included a reduction of sexual partners and an increase in condom use. Twende na Wakati influenced these behaviors by increasing communication among listeners about HIV/AIDS, awareness of personal risk of contracting HIV/AIDS, and self-efficacy (an individual’s belief that he or she can control specific outcomes in life) with respect to preventing HIV/AIDS.

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