Ten Lessons Learned from Breakthrough ACTION’s SBC for FP/RH Programs

Social and behavior change (SBC) is an essential component in achieving global development goals, including family planning (FP). SBC is a discipline that uses a deep understanding of human and societal behavior and evidence-based interventions—such as mass media, community group engagement, and interpersonal communication—to increase the adoption of healthy behaviors and influence the social norms that underpin those behaviors. Living up to the international community’s commitment to achieving universal access to reproductive health (RH) by 2030—including FP information and services—requires an understanding of the barriers to modern contraception use and what can facilitate that usage. FP programs need to consistently and systematically apply a behavioral lens to identify barriers and facilitators and implement strategically designed SBC interventions.

Since it was launched in 2017, Breakthrough ACTION has implemented a wide array of activities to improve FP outcomes, including both global and regional level advocacy, technical assistance, and capacity strengthening, as well as the country-level implementation of SBC campaigns and solutions.

This overview brief (English | French) shares the top ten key learnings from the project’s work on SBC for FP. Three complementary briefs dive into the details and project examples of these lessons learned and provide recommendations to implementing partners, governments, and donors looking to improve their SBC for FP/RH programming.

The three complementary briefs are:

• Going Beyond Engagement: Community-Centered Social and Behavior Change for Family Planning and Reproductive Health Programming (English | French)
• Strengthening Social and Behavior Change for Service Delivery: Tailoring Interventions for Different Stakeholders in Family Planning and Reproductive Health (English | French)
• Ensuring Effective Partnerships and Coordination for Social and Behavior Change for Family Planning and Reproductive Health (English | French)