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AIDS Behav (2012) 16:10541062 DOI 10.1007/s10461-011-0004-1
BRIEF REPORT
Polling Booth Surveys: A Novel Approach for Reducing Social Desirability Bias in HIV-Related Behavioural Surveysin Resource-Poor Settings
Catherine M. Lowndes A. A. Jayachandran Pradeep Banandur
Banadakoppa M. Ramesh Reynold Washington B. M. Sangameshwar
Stephen Moses James Blanchard Michel Alary
Published online: 3 August 2011 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011
Abstract This study compared rates of HIV-related sexual risk behaviours reported in individual face-to-face (FTFI) and group anonymous polling booth (PBS) interviews in India. In PBS, respondents grouped by gender and marital status answered yes/no questions by putting tokens with question numbers in colour-coded containers. Data were subsequently collated for each group as a whole, so responses were not traceable back to individuals. Male and female PBS participants reported substantially higher rates of pre-marital, extra-marital, commercial and anal sex than FTFI participants; e.g. 11 vs. 2% married males reported paying for sex; 6 vs. 1% unmarried males reported homosexual anal sex.
Keywords India HIV Social desirability bias
Sexual behaviour Survey methodologies
Interviewing techniques
Introduction
In the eld of HIV, accurate data on sexual and injecting behaviours are of central importance, to enable understanding of the factors driving transmission in different contexts and of how these may change over time, as well as for the design of preventive intervention programmes and the evaluation of their impact. As mathematical modelling becomes an increasingly important component of impact evaluation, accurate estimation of behavioural parameters is crucial to enable design of valid models which can reproduce the characteristics of HIV epidemics [1].
Due to the stigma associated with HIV/AIDS, and the social proscription of transmission-associated sexual and injecting risk behaviours in many contexts and cultures, reporting of relevant information is frequently subject to social desirability bias, particularly when relying on behavioural self-reports collected using one-to-one face-to-face interviewing techniques [2]. This may take the form of
C. M. Lowndes M. Alary
URESP, Centre de Recherche FRSQ du CHA Universitaire de Qubec, Quebec, Canada
C. M. Lowndes (&)
Department of HIV & Sexually Transmitted Infections, Health Protection ServicesColindale, Health Protection Agency, 61 Colindale Avenue, London NW9 5EQ, UK e-mail: [email protected]
C. M. LowndesLondon School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London, UK
A. A. Jayachandran P. Banandur
CHARME-India Project, Bangalore, India
P. BanandurRajarajeswari Medical College...