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Classifying safety interventions
Strategy Development
Evaluation
Classifying safety interventions
Overview of countermeasures to improve motorcycle safety as classified using the Haddon Matrix of Safety Interventions:
Strategy development
While a range of motorcycle safety issues and potential initiatives exist, a strategic approach to identifying the most important issues and selection of strategies is best practice. A number of economies have developed strategies for motorcycle safety (see the Developing motorcycle safety strategies case study). Developing a best-practice strategy requires clear identification of the need for a strategy; it is based on evidence that something needs to change and evidence of factors that can be changed. That is, there is an understanding for the nature and extent of the problem. There are also effective strategies that operate in other economies and thus there is potential to build on and adapt strategies to the new environment.
Evaluation
Evaluation is the process of critically examining a program. It is to understand the worth or value of an intervention. Evaluation involves collecting and analysing information about the aims, characteristics and outcomes of an intervention strategy.
The main reason for conducting evaluations is to make judgements about improving the effectiveness of interventions and to inform decision-making around interventions. Good evaluation involves methods that are replicable and rigorous.
Evaluation helps make sure that the intervention:
- is based on the best available evidence
- meets the needs of the users
- progresses the way it is intended
- works the way it is intended
- change occurs in the way it is intended.
Evaluations help to make informed decisions about whether programs can be continued, enhanced, expanded, shorted, or ended. They can help to understand how an intervention might be improved and why it has not been effective. Evaluations can help distinguish worthwhile interventions from those that are less worthwhile or ineffective.
There are several key steps to evaluation:
- identification of the goals and objectives of the strategy
- selection of the best method of evaluation
- selection of the way in which data is collected
- collection of data
- reporting findings.
A good evaluation:
- includes a solid design that's relevant to the target intervention
- builds on existing knowledge
- is transparent and feasible
- is accurate and uses appropriate methods and analyses
- forms the basis of further intervention design, refinement and selection, that is we learn from the intervention.
Some useful resources:
American Evaluation Association online resources
The Community Tool Box: Developing an Evaluation Plan
InformalScience.org
World Bank: The design and evaluation of road safety publicity campaigns [PDF]
World Bank: Road Software Tools
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