Doctoral Dissertation Research: Understanding the Mechanisms of Peer Influence in Adopting Health Products

SES-1602176托马斯·希门尼斯安娜·伦斯坦福大学本项目研究社会关系和互动如何塑造家庭的财务资源分配和投资。大量关于传播和社会影响的文献发现，有社会联系的人和家庭分享各种个人和家庭成果。然而，为什么这些决定和结果集中在社会联系中的证据在很大程度上是缺乏的。本研究的目的是确定通过社会行为者影响家庭消费决策的机制，使用同伴压力，参考群体和愿望的概念。分析受访者对他们的社会互动的描述以及这些互动如何影响他们的家庭决策，将有助于深入了解社会影响背后的机制，这也是扩散和传染研究所缺少的。由于扩散的速度和轨迹因社会影响机制而异，因此确定促进这种大型家庭投资扩散的相互作用类型将为类似决策和实践的扩散模型提供信息。本文的研究也将有助于学者？了解在资源有限的情况下促使和阻碍个人和家庭采用其他保健产品和技术的因素，特别是需要大量财政投资的产品。 该研究的重点是卫生基础设施在印度健康，特别是儿童健康中的作用，以及社会影响如何有助于家庭采用卫生基础设施，该项目的目标是确定其他社会行为者影响家庭消费决定的机制。 本研究采用混合方法研究设计，调查社会行为者影响他人消费偏好和决策的方式。 研究人员首先对调查数据进行了定量分析，以确定哪些社会，经济和村庄特征与家庭厕所所有权有关。 共同主要研究者将在2015年1月进行的家庭卫生试点研究的基础上完成实地工作，该研究由斯坦福大学国际发展中心资助。试点访谈表明，大家庭成员的意见和偏好是相当有影响力的家庭的财务决策。收集额外的访谈数据将使共同主要研究者能够收集和分析家庭成员关系、相对社会地位和愿望的详细描述，以及他们自己对卫生基础设施投资决定的描述。 这项研究的结果将对发展中国家贫穷家庭的消费选择的传播和理解模式产生影响。

SES-1602176Tomas JimenezAnna LunnStanford UniversityThis project examines how social ties and interactions shape households' financial resource allocations and investments. A vast literature on diffusion and social influence has found that a variety of individual and household outcomes are shared among people and households that have social connections. However, evidence for why these decisions and outcomes are clustered among social contacts is largely absent. The goal of this research is to identify the mechanisms through which social actors influence household consumption decisions using concepts of peer pressure, reference groups, and aspirations. Analyzing interviewees' descriptions of their social interactions and how these interactions shaped their households' decisions will provide insight into the mechanisms behind social influence, which has also been missing from studies of diffusion and contagion. Since the rate and trajectory of diffusion varies by the mechanisms of social influence, identifying the types of interactions that facilitate the spread of this large household investment will inform diffusion models of similar decisions and practices. This study will also contribute to scholars? knowledge of the factors that both contribute to and prevent individuals' and households' adoption of other health products and technologies in resource-constrained settings, especially products that require large financial investments. The research focuses on the role of sanitation infrastructure in health in India, particularly child health, and how social influence contributes to the household adoption of health infrastructure.The goal of the project is to identify the mechanisms through which other social actors influence household consumption decisions. The research uses a mixed methods research design to investigate the ways in which social actors influence others' consumption preferences and decisions. The researcher initially conducted a quantitative analysis of survey data to identify which social, economic and village characteristics are associated with household latrine ownership. The co-PI will complete field work that builds on a pilot study of household sanitation conducted in January 2015 with funding from the Stanford Center for International Development. Pilot interviews suggested that opinions and preferences of extended family members were quite influential in households' financial decisions. The collection of additional interview data will allow the co-PI to gather and analyze extended accounts of household members' relationships, relative social status, and aspirations in conjunction with their own descriptions of their decision to invest in sanitation infrastructure. The findings of this study will have implications for models of diffusion and understanding the consumption choices of poor households in developing countries.