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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
Suzanne Christopher, PhD, Alma Knows His Gun McCormick, Adina Smith, PhD, Victoria LaFromboise, BS, Vanessa Watts, BS, and Amy Lowry, MS. Department of Health and Human Development, Montana State University, 104 Hosaeus Complex, Bozeman, MT 59717, 406-994-6321, suzanne@montana.edu
We will discuss the development of interviewer training for Indian women interviewing other Indian women. The interviewing took place in the beginning phases of a community-based lay health advisor intervention on the Apsáalooke (Crow) Reservation in Southeastern Montana. Several aspects were taken into account while developing the interviewer training. The most important principle of this training was respect for the women being interviewed; respect for their words and their time. There is a history in Indian country of researchers/non-community members gathering information via surveys and this information not being shared with the community or used to help the community. Due to this exploitative history, some people are reluctant to complete surveys or be interviewed or if surveys are completed, to finish quickly and/or to not share too much information. Usual interviewer training for survey research emphasizes an authoritarian attitude that includes interviewer control, the interviewer always being correct, use of a “professional” attitude and tone of voice, and sticking to the survey and completing it as quickly as possible with as few distractions as possible. This training emphasized not pushing women if they did not want to take part, taking time with women, letting women know what will happen with information that they share, following-up on questions instead of just gathering information, and sharing health information after the interview. We felt that this process made it more likely that women were comfortable sharing information, leading to better outcomes for women involved, for the project, and for the entire community.
Learning Objectives:
Keywords: Native Populations, Community Health Planning
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.