Overcoming the Local Pothole Effect: How to Engage the Publics

by guest blogger, Maryna Taran

Photo source: grewlike

The more time I spend reading and writing about the field of international development and communication within that sphere, the more I understand that development, human rights and environmentalism are not the best dinner conversation topics. Even people who seem altruistic and empathetic get disengaged and quite frankly bored when they hear another horror story from a developing country.

During a recent presentation in my Health Communication class at American University in Washington, D.C., Ceci Connolly, a renowned journalist with a strong background in public health, summed-up my thoughts by saying something along the lines of: people are not likely to go home and talk about a crisis in Libya at dinner with their family, but highly likely to go home and talk about the health care reform, because it has a direct impact on them or because they may have had a neighbor who experienced first-hand some type of hospital malpractice. So, when it comes to communicating about global issues and/or advocating for causes that seem distant from people’s lives, it is difficult to establish a level of interest that will drive the public toward further actions or an attitude change.

A cute cat

Pictures of fly-ridden children or polar bears on melting icebergs typically don't entice people to protest in front of the White House, or "like" something on Facebook. So, why is it that local and personally-relevant issues are far more engaging (besides the obvious)?  Well, just like the Cute Cat Theory, which has people simply “stumbling upon” Internet advocacy issues while searching for pictures of cute cats and pornography, the Pothole Theory explains how people in general feel about international development issues.

The pothole theory boils down to one statement from Hersman – people care about themselves, their families, friends and people who are like them, so they want to engage in advocacy that relates to a “nasty pothole on [their] street that [they’ve] been scraping the undercarriage of [their] car against for a year.” 

Thus, to make disengaged advocacy “stick,” communication experts need to prime it in such a way that the information already has a “reference point” in the public’s mind. The information should already be readily accessible and somewhat relevant.

So, what does this mean? It means we should be using familiar imagery to frame the debate, as was done by Times magazine using a famous American historic photograph as a symbol for a fight against global warming. And there are ways similar to how large news channels make international news appealing – by making horrific personal stories seem to be happening to people just like their public, i.e. giving the character in the story a family, and an educational/employment background. The internet has many examples of websites that provide a collage of videos documenting people’s personal stories in advocating for specific causes, like ViewChange.org.

In the realm of online advocacy, individuals can also be engaged with a cause by having people use applications they know and love in a manner that exposes them to events that are in Steven Berlin Johnson’s words “just five blocks from your street [and which usually would be] the least interesting thing you could possibly imagine.”

Want to see the Pothole Effect in Action? Check out a viral video by the Enough Project that references to a familiar “I’m a Mac/ I’m a PC” concept in their message against the use of Congo’s natural resources in the production of electronics. Another example is a Filipino-produced Facebook game app, Alter Space, which focuses on reducing carbon emissions by setting game-play examples.

What's yours?

Need more information on the Pothole Effect? Check out a blog post Erik Hersman, one of Ushahidi's technological founders, where he further explains the theory and its differences by various experts, like Steven Berlin Johnson (co-founder of Outside.In, and his “Pothole Paradox”), John Mackie (his version of the Pothole Theory is called “self-referential altruism”), and even Adam Smith (Theory of Moral Sentiments).