Research Manual

RURAL RESEARCH PROJECT

A Guideline for the Students of

Mudra Institute of Communication, Ahmedabad
Rural Research Project

2010

Mudra Institute of Communications,

Ahmedabad –380 058
 PLEASE REMEMBER

While in the field for Rural Research, your assignment is three fold;

1. Write ethnography of the village with emphasis on mass-media and

consumer behaviour including media behaviour, and

2. Conduct a Communication Needs Assessment in any one of the

areas you find striking in the village where you think the village
needs communication intervention.

3. Suggest a communication strategy to help the situation

The ethnographic study will be completed with help of guidelines given

under the following sub heads:
- VILLAGE PROFILE
- VILLAGE RESOURCES
- SOCIAL STRUCTURE
- VILLAGE CULTURE
- MEDIA CONSUMPTION
- NEWSPAPER
- RADIO and TELEVISION
- CABLE CONNECTION
- BRAND CONSUMPTION

Second part of the guideline on page 13 gives you some tips on how to
conduct Communication Needs Assessment (CNA) in the village. Your
exercise on CNA would be useful in understanding the village scenario and
will help you in preparing a communication strategy to meet the
communication needs of the village in order to improve the situation.

You should write detailed account on the media consumption and

brand consumption by the rural people. A separate qualitative note will
be required on these two areas.

Since you are camping in the village in group of two to three students, you
among yourselves decide who will collect what part of data.

You must leave complete address and also about how to reach your study
village. We may try to contact you in the village.

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Each team should contact Programme Office or me (#9825712621) by
phone the day they reach the village.

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 BEFORE YOU PROCEED, ENSURE

1. You are carrying your MICA identity card.

2. You have collected a letter – TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN –

from the programme office. You may need to meet the local authority before
you reach the village. This is important both for protocol, administrative, and
safety reasons. The Block Development Officer (BDO) and village
functionaries some times insist on ‘orders’ from above.

3. You are carrying a medical kit with you. This should include, among other
things, medicine for such common ailments as cough, cold, fever, diarrhoea,
and even malaria. Also carry mosquito repellents.

4. Inform to your parents and to us at MICA about your complete village

address (along with PINCODE), telephone number, name of local contact,
etc. Remember you are going as MICA students and the local authorities
would also want to contact us, in case a need arises and we should be able to
give them complete detail.

5. Each team should carry a camera, extra photo rolls, and batteries to record
typical scenes from the village, which should be part of the rural report. You
should seek permission before clicking.

6. Do not carry too much cash. Avoid jewellery.

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 WHEN IN VILLAGE, ENSURE

1. A total of 13 days (from Sept. 26 to October 08, 2010) have been allotted for the
Rural Research. You are required to live in the villages for not less than seven days.

2. Respect local culture. Do not try to ‘educate’ the villagers. Conform to dress code,
customs throughout your stay. Do not forget you have invited yourself to the village.
You need them more than they need you. Be sensitive.

3. Avoid the tendency of just moving around. Mix up with local people, identify
informants, contact village level NGO workers and also visit nearby villages.

4. Try and understand the information network in the village. In the village there will be
people who will be more willing to reveal. Identify and be friendly with such people.

5. You should start by interviewing the Panchayat Officials, Village Level Worker
(VLW), health workers, Kotwar, Patwari and the schoolteachers in the village. They
will be helpful in getting you secondary information. You may also have to interview
the local authorities like Janpad (Mandal) member, Block Development Officer
(BDO). MUST GET as much as secondary data you can.

6. You must interview all the key persons from different religion, caste, and factions in
the village. And find out their views on the topic you have in mind. These people
may not represent reality. They are the elite. But faithfully report what they say and
then see if there is any difference from what the common man says. This shall make
you plan your communication strategies better in the future.

7. You may be going to study your own culture. We have a general tendency to miss
many observations, which we usually think, we know. Do not let this feeling
dominate. Observe every phenomenon minutely and record it. Analyse the
situation from Villagers’ point of view. DO NOT GIVE YOUR INTERPRETATION TO
DATA.

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 RURAL RESEARCH PROJECT GUIDELINES

I - ETHNOGRAPHY OF THE VILLAGE

1. VILLAGE PROFILE

The following areas will be the focus of the study

Demographic composition (All possible secondary data)
Number of households
♦ Family, type of family prevalent in different segments
Total Population
By caste / religion / gender / age
By primary occupation
By land holding
Source of Data
♦ Village functionaries - Patwari, Sarpanch and VLW
Methods of Data Collection

♦ Data on Structured Formats

2. VILLAGE RESOURCES

The following areas will be the focus of the study

♦ Distance from the nearest town in kms. and the approach - time spent in travelling.
♦ Bus station/stop in the village
♦ Main occupations of the Villagers – different levels
♦ Type of crops grown in the area
♦ Whether following amenities exist in the village. If NO, how far are these institutions
from the Village? If YES, are they operational?
Healthcare facility
Animal Husbandry centre
Educational Institutions - School etc. (primary and high school)
Post office and PCO
Bank
♦ Existence of any NGO, nature of works undertaken and its impact on the village life.
Impact should be evaluated from the villagers’ point of view – felt as well perceived.

Method of data collection

♦ Depth interviews of teachers, village traders, Sarpanch, and health workers etc.
♦ In depth interviews with two educated youths on their attitude towards farming and farming
techniques.
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3. SOCIAL STRUCTURE

Social structure can be understood as hierarchical arrangement of different social

positions. Positions, which are at the similar levels of hierarchy, can be understood as
belonging to same class. This hierarchy can be arranged on the basis of gender, caste
or religion, or achievement principles. Village structure was based on principles on birth,
which has slowly been changing to achievement principles. These determine the Social
Status, Power, Resource Mobilisation, and Political Dominance of individuals
depending upon the social positions occupied by them.

Here we aim to understand:

♦ Social structure
Caste and religious groups in the village
Dominant caste of the village, factors of dominance
Caste, dominant caste faction formation and political power
Caste and consumption pattern – food/ drinks
Caste based clothes and clothing
Notion of food among different caste/groups
Method of data collection

♦ Observation of intra and inter caste differences in the village based on sharing
food/water
- Are there other criteria of friendship formation?
- What is the mode of relationship between different castes?
♦ In-depth interview with key informant of each major caste
♦ In-depth interview with the temple or village priest

3-4 page detailed anecdotal note of an experience undergone by a caste member

Identify at least two village elders (‘wise men’) who can narrate their own experiences.
You must jot down yourself in the language they narrate.
The form of conversation would be what was before and what is now.
This would provide you data for the focus area - Transition in Village

THESE GUIDELINES ARE FOR THE IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW. IT SHOULD BE

ADDED BY YOUR OBSERVATION ON THE INTRA-CASTE AND INTER-CASTE
INTERACTIONS

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4. VILLAGE CULTURE

A guide on questions to be asked to get relevant answers on Culture

To what extent the values and aspirations of the villagers are influenced by mass media
exposure?
Have values changed over time? What values are perceived as having changed?
In what ways has it changed? What factors would have caused the values to change?
How have marriages changed over time (ceremonies, duration, pomp and decorations,
bride / bridegroom behaviour, distance of bride’s village, love marriages, etc)? What
have caused these changes? Do they like it?

Number of temples in the village. Deities installed. Who visits the temples? In whose
locality are they located? Are lower castes allowed into the temple? What religious
festivals are celebrated with gaiety? What roles are assigned to different castes and
communities in them? Any changes in celebration? What necessitated the change?
Are people happy with changes?

Describe beliefs and rituals associated with birth and death.

Attitude towards the birth of male and female children.
Number of children a family should have and the ratio of girl and boy

5 MEDIA CONSUMPTION

The following areas will be the focus of the study:

1. Media penetration in the village
Newspaper
Radio
Television
Cable TV / Satellite channel
2. Media behaviour (reading/listening/viewing)
3. Perceptions of Media
4. Consumption of information
5. Impact of Media

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5.1 NEWSPAPER

Areas of Investigation

♦ How many households receive daily news paper

♦ Names of newspapers that come to the village?
♦ Who delivers the newspaper to the village?
♦ Who reads the newspaper first?
♦ Do women read newspaper? If yes, when? What pages? Who are they?
♦ Do people discuss news items? Describe these situations in detail.

Method of data collection

♦ 2 interviews with people who subscribe the newspaper

♦ 2 interviews with people who don’t subscribe but read the newspaper

5.2 RADIO

Areas of Investigation

♦ Find out approximately how many households own radio or transistors.

♦ Radio listening habits of males. What kind of programme genre is more popular
among males: news, drama, film songs, sponsored programmes etc.
♦ Radio listening habits of females. What kind of programme genre is more popular
among females: news, drama, film songs, sponsored programmes etc. What
programmes do they listen to?
♦ Is listening a radio a community activity? Is it played at shops in the village?
♦ How has television affected radio listening?

Method of data collection

You can combine questions on television and radio in focus groups for male viewers of
age group 15-25, 25 and above, unmarried and married female viewers.

5.3 TELEVISION

Areas of Investigation

♦ Number of TV sets in the village?

♦ Who all have access to the TV and at what time?
♦ TV viewing habits of males. What kind of programme genre is more popular among
males: news, drama, film songs, sponsored programmes etc. What programmes do
they watch? Which TV channel is watched most?

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♦ TV viewing habits of females. What kind of programme genre is more popular among
females: news, drama, film songs, sponsored programmes etc. What programmes
do they watch regularly view? Which TV channel is watched most?

♦ What programmes’ are watched by children? Why?

♦ For how many hours in a day do the villagers get power supply?
♦ When there is no power, how do they run TV?

Method of data collection

─ A Group discussion with male viewers in the age group of 15-25, anther with 25+..
─ A Group discussion with male viewers in the age group of 15-25, anther with 25+..
─ Interview at length the cable operator in the village (if they have).

Operational guidelines for groups: Almost all the participants of the focus group must
have a television set. As far as possible, the male member of the research team should
conduct focus group among male and female member of the research team conduct
focus group with female members.

6 BRAND CONSUMPTION

This section aims to find out the reasons for brand consumption and Barriers to brand
consumption in a village
* Durables
* Agro inputs
* FMCGs

A guide on questions to be asked to get relevant answers on Brand Consumption

There are various types of goods and products, which are utilized by people in village.
Some of them are from national companies having names like Lux, and then there are
some from local companies like ____.
What we are interested in finding out is why people purchase things from the national
reputed companies, the reasons for such behaviour? Are these reasons different for
different products like Durables, Agro inputs, and FMCGs.

(RESPONDENT MAY GIVE REASONS LIKE GOOD QUALITY, TRUST ON THE

COMPANY ETC. FOR EACH OF THE REASONS CITED PLEASE ASK)

Demand Creation Activities

Distribution:
1. number and kind of outlets where available
2. source of supply of the retailer, where does he get it?
3. Outdoor, hoarding, wall painting etc.
4. Fairs and exhibitions and promotions at haats
5. Unconventional communication

Method of data collection

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You may ask these questions while conducting focus group on TV consumption. If you
want to conduct separate FGDs for these questions –feel free to do so!

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 II - COMMUNICATION NEEDS ASSESSMENT

Some of the possible areas of Communication Needs Assessment could be:

• Women empowerment
• Child rearing and cognitive development
• Education - Children’s education, Girl’s education, Adult education
• Agriculture and Animal Husbandry
• Healthcare and Reproductive and Child Health
• Family values and Family norms
• Sanitation and public Hygiene
• Consumer behaviour
• Consumer education
• House structure and ventilation

Whatever area you have selected for the study, study the needs in holistic way -
1. What is the problem
2. Why is the problem
3. How many in the village have been affected by the problem
4. Attitude of the rest of the population about the problem
5. How do the affected population presently tackle the problem
6. Which are media in use for feeding information in the concerned area
7. Awareness about the problem – unaware, partly aware, fully aware
8. Awareness about solution of problem – unaware, partly aware, fully aware
9. Credibility of different media used to inform about the problem and its solution
10. Which of the present media is having better penetration
11. Which of the present media is having better credibility
12. Which of the media reaching to them presently is preferred most
13. What medium/media will be preferred by them
14. How the new communication strategy would help them
15. Financial / infra-structural supports required to convert the information into
action

This exercise on Communication Needs Assessment would be useful in

understanding the strength and limitation of present communication system (in
specific area identified by you) and will help you in preparing a communication
strategy to meet the communication needs of the village in order to improve the
situation.

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 III - COMMUNICATION STRATEGY

As students of Communications Management, you are required to prepare a

‘Communication Strategy’ with a suggested action plan to help the situation
through effective communication. You plan should be SMART plan.

S - Simple that cab be used at local level –district and bellow

M - Measurable for its effectiveness

A - Affordable by the local authority/people
R - Replicable by simple need based modification, and
T - Time bound – can be completed in few months

While suggesting the communication strategy please keep in mind the

characteristics and composition of your target group, access and penetration of
the medium/media and the preference of the target group for specific
medium/media.

Your report should show your rigour of field

work, quality of data, ability of data analysis,
and creativity in presentation.

We hope that it will be memorable and

meaningful exercise for all of you and your
report will be full of insights for many of us at
MICA.

WORK HARD, LEARN A LOT, AND ENJOY THE MOST

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