NOTE: This is an update of a previous Trending Topic.
This update includes recently produced tools and examples. Newly added items are at the top of each list.
Gender roles and relations impact a broad array of health and development issues—from economic empowerment to governance to violence against women and HIV and AIDS. Social norms and expectations of how men and women should behave are a key determinant of health and development outcomes, as are structural issues such as inequitable laws and policies. Over the last decade, the field of gender equality programming has grown in its scope and sophistication, tackling our understanding of femininity and masculinity, as well as addressing gender as a continuum by looking at transgender and intersex issues.
Social and behavior change (SBC) interventions can work to reinforce positive gender norms or support communities in establishing new ones. Interventions, such as advocacy to address inequitable legislation, can also address social and structural barriers. More generally, intentionally including attention to gender issues can help SBC programs attain their health and development outcomes, particularly when space is given to help communities critically reflect on gender and find culturally appropriate ways to shift existing beliefs, attitudes, and social norms.
Peer-Reviewed Literature
Bates-Jeffreys, Ellen et al. 2019. The Road to Testing Innovations in Behavior Change and Gender Norms: How Can We Leverage Mobile Phone Technology to Reach and Engage Men to Reduce Violence Against Women? Innovations for Poverty Action. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
Bingenheimer, Jeffrey, et al. 2019. Advancing Social Norms Practice for Adolescent and Youth Sexual and Reproductive Health: The Why and the How. Science Direct, 64:4 April 2019. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
Gender Equality, Norms, and Health. 2019. The Lancet. Retrieved July 3, 2019.
Van Der Gaag, Nikki, et al. 2019. State of the World’s Fathers: Unlocking the Power of Men’s Care. Promundo. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
Diaz, Maria, et al. 2016. Integrating and Mainstreaming Gender into Social and Behavior Change Programs: What Does it Take? Chemonics. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
Diiro, Gracious M., et al. 2016. The Role of Gender on Malaria Preventive Behaviour among Rural Households in Kenya. Malaria Journal 2016 15:14. Retrieved June 26, 2019.
Pulerwitz, Julie, et al. 2010. Addressing Gender Dynamics and Engaging Men in HIV Programs: Lessons Learned from Horizons Research. Public Health Reports. Retrieved June 24, 2019.
This tool provides an advocacy implementation plan template that helps users identify priority FP/RH decision-makers, assess their current level of familiarity with or support for male engagement, and tailor a unique advocacy goal and approach based on that decision maker’s specific priorities and spheres of influence.
The Gender and Social and Behavior Change Communication Implementation Kit (I-Kit) provides a step-by-step approach to integrate gender into an existing SBCC strategy or marketing plan.
Reproductive empowerment (RE) includes people’s ability to participate in public and private discussions and act collectively on reproductive health matters. This database contains examples or literature about sexual and reproductive health (SRH) interventions that address concepts in the RE conceptual model which is found here.
This webinar seeks to highlight distinct methods of gender integration throughout the program cycle for comprehensive SBCC using examples and experiences from three diverse organizations – CARE, ACDI/VOCA, and SPRING/Senegal.
This report focuses on the need to address patriarchal control of adolescent girls’ sexuality in the fight against child, early and forced marriage and unions, and highlights the vital role played by gender-transformative programs. The report presents findings from a review of 23 organizations that work at the intersection of child marriage and sexuality, and includes three case studies that feature the work of grassroots organizations working in politically and culturally conservative contexts.
ALIGN is a digital platform and program of work that works to create a global community of researchers and thought leaders, all committed to gender justice and equality. It provides new research, insights from practice, and grants for initiatives that increase our understanding of – and what works to change – discriminatory gender norms.
This fact sheet offers basic information about the ways in which gender can affect malaria prevention and treatment. It notes cases in the Gambia and Kenya, describing how gender issues were studied and addressed to deal with the gender differences.
On June, 9, 2017, the Government of Canada released its Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP) to advance gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.
This toolkit is a practical guide for public health professionals seeking to understand how gender can impact health outcomes, both through service delivery and access to information and care. Its primary focus is sexual, reproductive, maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health.
The Align Guide brings together evidence to unpack the concepts around gender norms and masculinities across a number of key themes.
This document outlines essential elements that WASH practitioners should take into account at all points in the programme cycle in order to enhance a gender-responsive approach to their work.
This document provides Save the Children's statement and vision on gender equality.
The Technical and Operational Performance Support (TOPS) Program and CARE USA created this set of field-friendly activities.
The Gender Integration Continuum Training Session User’s Guide is a tool to help new and experienced gender trainers plan, prepare for, and facilitate the Gender Integration Continuum training session.
This document is designed to promote the introduction of a gender perspective into communication for development initiatives in rural areas, and suggests practical ways of going about this. It consists of two parts.
Planning for Life aims to improve the health of young men and women ages 10-24 by addressing their reproductive health
needs and by promoting the integration of reproductive health (RH) and family planning (FP) as critical components of youth
This is a compilation of practical resources for gender integration and mainstreaming in health policies, programs and institutions. It is designed as a companion to the IGWG website, a site for gender and reproductive health information, publications and networking.
This framework seeks to address the intersection of women's empowerment and media development. Its main focus is on the equality and gender dimensions of social diversity in the media.
Research shows that young people need chances to learn about gender equality and human rights, particularly because these issues affect their sexual lives, and indeed, their happiness. Most sex education programs have lagged in applying these findings.
This guideline sets out what is required of services and individual practitioners to provide gender-sensitive care for women, men and people who identify as transgender or intersex.
Voices for Change, V4C (Nigeria, 2013-2017) was a program which worked to strengthen the enabling environment for gender equality in Nigeria. The program targeted young women and men aged 16–25 years old and operated in four states in Nigeria: Enugu, Kaduna, Kano and Lagos. For some activities it operated at the federal level.
Transforming Masculinities is an evidence-based approach used in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR) to promote gender equality and positive masculinities within faith communities.
Qualitative research is particularly valuable for understanding gender norms that affect adolescent girls, because it allows people’s own perspectives and voices to come through, and gives the researcher a deeper, more nuanced understanding of the complexities involved in studying gender norms.
Gender is a cross-cutting issue that can inform decision making and best practices in all health areas. HIV care and treatment, for example, has benefitted from increased attention to gender inequities over the past decade.
From 2009 to 2011, ICRW collaborated with government, civil society, and donor organizations in Uganda and Cambodia to do the following:
• Identify strengths and gaps in how these two countries’ national strategies, policies and action plans address gender inequality as a social driver of HIV;
This resource is from the Brothers for Life campaign, which was launched in 2009 and seeks to address the risks associated with multiple and concurrent partnerships, sex and alcohol abuse, and gender based violence; and which also promotes HIV testing, male involvement in PMTCT, and other health seeking behaviors.
African Transformation™ helps women and men explore gender norms and social roles, and provides them with tools to begin changing the negative and reinforcing the positive.
This is the main website listing the resources from the Brothers for Life campaign which was launched 2009 to address the risks associated with multiple and concurrent partnerships, sex and alcohol abuse, and gender based violence and which also promoted HIV testing, male involvement in PMTCT and other health seeking behaviors.
Go Girls! was guided by a comprehensive, five stage research portfolio including a literature review, formative research, baseline survey, process evaluation, and endline survey.
These reports tell the story of Go Girls! activities in Botswana and Mozambique
Surveys carried out throughout the project found:
The Gender Roles, Equality and Transformations (GREAT) Project works to improve gender equity and reproductive health in Northern Uganda.
Program H (for men) and Program M (for women) were born out of a belief that changing rigid, inequitable, homophobic and violent versions of what it means to be a man are key to achieving health, achieving women’s and girls’ empowerment and central to social justice efforts. Program D (for diversity) was then added.
This website is made possible by the support of the American People through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) under the Breakthrough-ACTION Project, supported by USAID’s Office of Population and Reproductive Health, Bureau for Global Health, under Cooperative Agreement #AID-OAA-A-17-00017 with the Johns Hopkins University.
Breakthrough-ACTION is based at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Communication Programs (JHU∙CCP). The contents of this website are the sole responsibility of JHU∙CCP. The information provided on this website is not official U.S. Government information and does not necessarily represent the views or positions of USAID, the United States Government, or The Johns Hopkins University.
