Symbol recognition and interpretation of HIV/AIDS pictorial messages among rural women in Abia State Nigeria

Abstract

The study investigated the effect of use of symbols and pictorials in designing HIV/AIDS educational preventive interventions in selected rural communities in Abia State, Nigeria. One hundred and eighty respondents composed of female between the ages of (25-55) years were chosen for the study. Data were collected using structured questionnaire and focus group discussion and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results show that about 89% of the respondents recognized pictures 1, while 56% of the respondents interpreted correctly, for picture 2, 62.2% recognized the picture while 76.7% interpreted correctly. For picture 3, 57% of the respondents were able to recognize the picture while 88% interpreted the pictures correctly. Also 66% of the respondents recognized the pictures while 69% of the respondents interpreted the pictures correctly. The result shows a significant difference between the conventional media (x̄ = 1.655) and pictoral message (x̄ = 3.8764). The study concludes that the respondents were able to recognise and interprete symbol, using conventional media but were more comfortable using pictorial’s. The study recommends that use of pictorial message for HIV/AIDS campaigns should be encouraged to benefit the women with low literacy skills.

Keywords: Visual literacy, women entrepreneurs and HIV/AIDS