Graduation as Resilience Stage Two
Lead Research Organisation:
BRAC Centre
Department Name: Research and Evaluation Division
Abstract
Important development programmes such as microfinance often do not reach the very poorest households. A new set of initiatives, called Graduation programmes, have targeted these very poor households. Their objective is to graduate them out of poverty in a sustainable manner and make them resilient so they do not fall back into poverty.
Most of these programmes target women and use some form of asset transfer, and perhaps stipends for a fixed period. In addition to this material support they often help clients to strengthen their social network. Typically, programmes expect to work with clients for two years before they are ready to graduate.
In addition some programmes provide psychological support to these poor women who are often marginalised socially and often have very little confidence to engage even in petty business. But not all programmes include this component. The question is should they?
How important is psychological support such as life planning, confidence building and strengthening social awareness in helping poor women to graduate in a resilient way? Surprisingly, no research has actually addressed this question. It is a development frontier and we do not know for sure what the answer is.
This research is stage two of a project seeking to answer this question. In stage one, the research team adopted a well-known model of psychological wellbeing and tested it on a sample of women from a BRAC programme called 'Challenging the Frontiers of Poverty Reduction: Targeting the Ultra-Poor' (CFPR-TUP) There has been a lot of economic and social research on this programme and almost all the evidence shows that it is effective in bringing poor women and their households out of poverty and that is also efficient in terms of cost. However none of this research has really focused on the relative importance of the different inputs -material, social and psychological. In particular the psychological dimension has had no research. We do not know whether these softer inputs provided through informal counselling and through confidence building workshops make any difference.
The stage one research took advantage of a large data set that has been collected over four rounds since 2007 on economic and social dimensions of change in client households. It also generated a new set of client data giving them scores on the psychological model because there is not any existing data to work with. The researchers first of all used statistical routines to explore the psychological wellbeing model with this new data. It then compared psychological wellbeing scores with scores on income and other dimensions of material progress. It established that three key dimensions of psychological wellbeing are closely associated with material improvement. It also showed that, compared to a control group, members of the programme performed better in two out of three of these dimensions.
Stage two research will seek to validate these findings by testing them across a fresh sample taken from three different programmes seeking to reduce extreme poverty. The research will refine the existing questionnaire based upon methods used in social psychology. The questionnaire will be canvassed with 1,800 households across the three programmes, only one of which provides psychological support and for all of which matching socio-economic data is available.
After collecting this new data, the researchers will run a series of statistical tests focusing on whether the programme providing psychological inputs performs better or not. Together with the socio-economic data, this new data will help establish whether psychological support to poor clients is adding value by strengthening or speeding up progress out of poverty. The results will be shared with groups of the clients to provide some ground-truthing of the analytic findings. The results will then also be shared broadly within the national and international development community.
Most of these programmes target women and use some form of asset transfer, and perhaps stipends for a fixed period. In addition to this material support they often help clients to strengthen their social network. Typically, programmes expect to work with clients for two years before they are ready to graduate.
In addition some programmes provide psychological support to these poor women who are often marginalised socially and often have very little confidence to engage even in petty business. But not all programmes include this component. The question is should they?
How important is psychological support such as life planning, confidence building and strengthening social awareness in helping poor women to graduate in a resilient way? Surprisingly, no research has actually addressed this question. It is a development frontier and we do not know for sure what the answer is.
This research is stage two of a project seeking to answer this question. In stage one, the research team adopted a well-known model of psychological wellbeing and tested it on a sample of women from a BRAC programme called 'Challenging the Frontiers of Poverty Reduction: Targeting the Ultra-Poor' (CFPR-TUP) There has been a lot of economic and social research on this programme and almost all the evidence shows that it is effective in bringing poor women and their households out of poverty and that is also efficient in terms of cost. However none of this research has really focused on the relative importance of the different inputs -material, social and psychological. In particular the psychological dimension has had no research. We do not know whether these softer inputs provided through informal counselling and through confidence building workshops make any difference.
The stage one research took advantage of a large data set that has been collected over four rounds since 2007 on economic and social dimensions of change in client households. It also generated a new set of client data giving them scores on the psychological model because there is not any existing data to work with. The researchers first of all used statistical routines to explore the psychological wellbeing model with this new data. It then compared psychological wellbeing scores with scores on income and other dimensions of material progress. It established that three key dimensions of psychological wellbeing are closely associated with material improvement. It also showed that, compared to a control group, members of the programme performed better in two out of three of these dimensions.
Stage two research will seek to validate these findings by testing them across a fresh sample taken from three different programmes seeking to reduce extreme poverty. The research will refine the existing questionnaire based upon methods used in social psychology. The questionnaire will be canvassed with 1,800 households across the three programmes, only one of which provides psychological support and for all of which matching socio-economic data is available.
After collecting this new data, the researchers will run a series of statistical tests focusing on whether the programme providing psychological inputs performs better or not. Together with the socio-economic data, this new data will help establish whether psychological support to poor clients is adding value by strengthening or speeding up progress out of poverty. The results will be shared with groups of the clients to provide some ground-truthing of the analytic findings. The results will then also be shared broadly within the national and international development community.
Planned Impact
The primary beneficiaries will be the ultra-poor households for whom graduation programmes are designed. The objective is to try and improve design by assessing the inputs provided and the end result should be inputs being more appropriate than they might otherwise have been. This may be relatively easier to accomplish in BRAC itself but BRAC's donors, including DFID who are the major funders of the CFPR programme, have a strong funding and advocacy role on working with the extreme poor beyond Bangladesh.
Results from this research, if convincing to DFID, may be an important contribution to ultra poor programmes in Bangladesh where they support several initiatives beyond CFPR. DFID are also uniquely well-placed to bring interesting and policy relevant research results to the wider development community.
The international donor community are deeply concerned about results-based management and the cost effectiveness of aid both for their own efficiency as public bodies but also to defend aid budgets in hard times -working with ultra poor households in poor countries is one area where evidence-based improvement may be a substantial argument in support of retaining development funding.
Academic beneficiaries will include some of the most important figures in development impact evaluation who have engaged extensively with graduation programmes. There has been a clear recognition in the literature that research on psychological wellbeing is needed; there is a belief that it may well explain differences in programme performance.
Graduation programmes are likely to grow in number and size across the developing world and may well have a clearly defined role in the post-2015 agenda. If this research can establish the importance of psychological wellbeing inputs it has the potential to exert decisive influence on the design of poverty reduction interventions.
Results from this research, if convincing to DFID, may be an important contribution to ultra poor programmes in Bangladesh where they support several initiatives beyond CFPR. DFID are also uniquely well-placed to bring interesting and policy relevant research results to the wider development community.
The international donor community are deeply concerned about results-based management and the cost effectiveness of aid both for their own efficiency as public bodies but also to defend aid budgets in hard times -working with ultra poor households in poor countries is one area where evidence-based improvement may be a substantial argument in support of retaining development funding.
Academic beneficiaries will include some of the most important figures in development impact evaluation who have engaged extensively with graduation programmes. There has been a clear recognition in the literature that research on psychological wellbeing is needed; there is a belief that it may well explain differences in programme performance.
Graduation programmes are likely to grow in number and size across the developing world and may well have a clearly defined role in the post-2015 agenda. If this research can establish the importance of psychological wellbeing inputs it has the potential to exert decisive influence on the design of poverty reduction interventions.
Publications
Description | Programmes designed to address poverty in the world's poorest countries and households are a development priority including through Aid funding and this research is helping to improve the design and implementation of these programmes. Poor people often lack self-belief, and repeated setbacks mean that they often lack any hope for the future. As a consequence they may not respond as well as hoped to development programmes aiming to improve their economic security because their aspirations, their hope for the future, is too limited. This research has addressed this problem through demonstrating the importance of one to one coaching by trained staff to help programme participants develop positive aspirations. We find that this approach energizes them to utilize programme services and implement sustainable livelihood activities. |
Exploitation Route | The key way we hope our findings will be taken forward is in the design of programmes targeting the extreme poor in developing countries. We hope that it will encourage a commitment to one to one coaching and confidence building and, more generally, providing inputs addressing the psychological wellbeing of programme participants. |
Sectors | Communities and Social Services/Policy |
Description | There is a growing development debate, broadly within the social protection, jobs and livelihoods fields around the importance of scaling up 'graduation' programmes. Much of this debate concerns the proper identification of the 'additionality' from the multiple types of programme inputs associated with graduation programmes. This research is helping to demonstrate the key role of one of the most expesnive inputs- one to one coaching of poor women; this is designed to encourage their positive aspirations and energize them around implementation of improved sustainable livelihoods...giving them hope and self-belief. |
First Year Of Impact | 2016 |
Sector | Communities and Social Services/Policy |
Impact Types | Societal Economic Policy & public services |
Description | Programme design |
Geographic Reach | National |
Policy Influence Type | Contribution to a national consultation/review |
Description | Academic visit funding |
Amount | $10,000 (USD) |
Organisation | FONKOZE |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
Country | United States |
Start | 12/2016 |
End | 12/2016 |
Title | psychological wellbeing questionnaire |
Description | Adaptation of Psychological Wellbeing model developed by Carol Ryff (University of Wisconsin) for application to/with extreme poor rural women in Bangladesh. |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2016 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Further use in research (Haiti, ongoing) and application in programme monitoring (PKSF, proposed). |
Title | Stage Two data |
Description | 1,800 household data set covering both socioeconomic and psychological wellbeing characteristics of members. |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2017 |
Provided To Others? | No |
Impact | Widespread interest in its further use in extreme poverty programme research |
Description | Research partner |
Organisation | Palli Karma Sahayak Foundation |
Country | Bangladesh |
Sector | Charity/Non Profit |
PI Contribution | Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation (PKSF) is the main government institution delivering programmes and services to improve the livelihoods of the extreme poor. We collaborated with two of their programmes on extreme poverty to undertake research on psychological wellbeing. |
Collaborator Contribution | Staff time; access to programmes in the field; logistical support, dissemination activities. |
Impact | National Seminar in Bangladesh - 'Graduation as Resilience: Addressing Psychological Wellbeing- Does it matter for extreme poverty programmes? Psychology, Sociology, Economics. |
Start Year | 2016 |
Description | Presentation of results |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Presentation at an international conference on graduation programmes hosted by LSE. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | national seminar |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | About 50 people attended our presentation of research findings on extreme poverty and psychological wellbeing. There has been good follow up suggesting that the event has stimulated funders and implementing agencies to address psychological wellbeing in poverty programme design. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |