Understanding How PYD Programs Achieve Positive Impact in LMICs:
Do PYD programs in LMICs achieve their longer-term/sectoral outcomes by effecting PYD outcomes?
- Do PYD programs impact their intended PYD outcomes?
- Are changes in PYD outcomes linked to improved longer-term, sectoral outcomes for program beneficiaries?
The Society for Prevention Research published standards of evidence for efficacy, effectiveness, and scale-up which include testing the causal theory of the intervention, in other words, demonstrate program mechanisms. This demonstration is especially important in LMICs where activities need to be tailored to the local situation. Ongoing conflict, instability, and other local conditions can make it impossible to replicate the activities of a program that was successful elsewhere. Evidence for which PYD constructs were influenced by successful programs can help program developers find culturally sensitive and context appropriate ways to influence those program mechanisms (sometimes called mediators) which have been demonstrated to be effective in other places.
- We continue to see gaps in research that directly addresses questions about how PYD programs achieve impact when they do.
- Although it is promising to see that PYD programs are working in LMIC across sectors and contexts, there are very few rigorous evaluations which include formal tests of how they work.
- Collecting qualitative or quantitative data on the PYD constructs which programs are designed to influence as well as the intended sector-specific outcomes of interest is required in order to achieve this.
- We have seen more of this measurement in recent years, but almost no analyses of these data which demonstrate that program-related improvements in assets, agency, contribution, and enabling environments are what lead to observed program impacts on outcomes, such as employment, violence, and reproductive health.
See also: How can PYD programs that have proven to be effective be adapted to different contexts?
