EXPOSURE TO A COMMUNITY-LEVEL HIV PREVENTION INTERVENTION - WHO GETS THE MESSAGE

As part of the evaluation of a community-level HIV prevention program for women, this study examined predictors of exposure to print media a nd community outreach and assessed the relationship between exposure t o the intervention and condom use behavior. Data from interviews with 479 women randomly selected from the intervention community in 1995 an d 1996 were examined. Analysis of demographic and risk characteristics were conducted to identify predictors of exposure to the project's HI V prevention messages. Additionally logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine the effects of intervention exposure on condom us e, controlling for factors related to exposure. The results revealed t hat the print media campaign reached the largest number of women. Howe ver, women at highest risk did not have high rates of exposure to prin t media, but had greater exposure to outreach. Exposure to print media had an effect on increased communication with a main partner about co ndom use, but was not significantly related to condom use last time ha d sex. There were no significant main effects for exposure to outreach on condom use behavior. An important finding of this analysis was tha t each intervention strategy was successful in reaching a different po rtion of the target population and that exposure had differential effe cts on the condom use behavior of particular segments of the target po pulation.