Research findings of the effects of an HIV/AIDS awareness program in owerri, Nigeria: Lessons garnered as an external evaluator

HIV/AIDS is a global crisis, but Sub-Saharan Africa region has been more severely affected by AIDS than any other part of the world. The overall rate of infection among adults in Sub-Saharan Africa, according to the United Nations, is 7.5%-8.5%, compared with 1.1% worldwide. In Nigeria, it is estimated that 3.1 percent of adults between ages 15-49 are living with HIV/AIDS. In 2010, we the researchers from the University of Cincinnati conducted this study in two major Higher institutions of Owerri Imo State Nigeria to evaluation the effects of an HIV/AIDS awareness program on college students in the State.

The primary purpose of the study was to demonstrate that properly planned and carefully executed awareness training programs could, possibly, provide positive effects on the knowledge, attitude, and behavior of young college students regarding HIV/AIDS. A pre- post-intervention research was designed for the study, incorporating the Domain-Reference Testing (DRT) methodology. Knowledge, attitude, and perceived behavior of participants were measured before the intervention, and the same variables were measured after the completion of the training intervention.

In this presentation, the findings of the evaluation will be shared, and more importantly, the inherent pitfall for a transcontinental external evaluator will be presented. Among the principal findings is the fact that although the data generated from the study suggested various percentage changes in the attitude, knowledge and perceived behaviors of the participants from per-intervention to post-intervention, the training program contributed very minimally to those changes. Handouts will be distributed to participants of the section.