An Ethno-Statistical Analysis of Direct and Indirect Acts in Catchy HIV/AIDS Campaign Messages in Benin Metropolis

Abstract

Catchy HIV/AIDS campaign messages in the Benin metropolis exhibit the characteristics of direct and indirect acts. These acts play pragmatic roles in peoples’ understanding of catchy HIV/AIDS campaign messages in the Benin metropolis. This paper investigates direct and indirect acts in HIV/AIDS catchy campaign messages in the Benin metropolis from an ethnic-statistical perspective; it assesses respondents’ understanding of the campaign messages with the features of directness and indirectness. The data for the study were collected using questionnaires from five LGAs in the Benin metropolis. These are Oredo, Ikpoba-Okha, Ovia-North-East and Ovia-South-West and the data was analysed using simple percentages. The paper reveals that some respondents could not understand some of the messages because of the pragmatic indirectness. It was also observed that background characteristics (age, education, gender, and ethnic group), understandable language for reading and writing of respondents and how HIV/AIDS messages were known to play a major role in understanding the direct and indirect acts in the messages. The paper concludes by advising the message provider to write in simpler form for the effectiveness of these campaign messages, creating messages in native languages is also encouraged.