Child rights action with informed and engaged societies
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Impact Data - Raju

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Raju was a comic book published in 1973 to promote nutritional awareness among school-aged children (grades 3, 4, and 5) in India.

Raju was designed by CARE as one of 12 media used in a nutrition education campaign in the North and South of India.

Methodologies
The comic book was evaluated in two ways:
  • children in schools where the comic had been distributed; and
  • an extensive media impact evaluation involving 2,400 interviews with adults (evaluating the impact of each of the 12 media, regardless of intended audience).
Knowledge Shifts
The comic book was effective in conveying basic ideas about food and its relation to health to the majority of those interviewed.

The booklet was also successful in conveying detailed information about the benefits of lentils and green leafy vegetables to a sizeable percentage of the students. On a series of nine specific questions, correct answers ranged from 60% to 90%.

Although the comics were distributed only to students, they were read by a significant number of adults, with over 12% of those interviewed citing the booklets as one of their sources of information about nutrition.
Access
The comic book was very popular with school children, with 95% of them indicating that they had read and enjoyed the story.
Source
Parlato, et.al. (1980); and "The Use of Mainstream Media to Encourage Social Responsibility: The International Experience" - The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation - Prepared by: Jennifer Daves and Liza Nickerson - The Media Project.