Social Networks, Risk Perceptions and Changing Attitudes Towards HIV/AIDS: New Evidence from a Longitudinal Study Using Fixed-Effect Estimation.
Stéphane Helleringer and Hans-Peter Kohler
Abstract: Social and cultural "barriers" to behavioral change have often been proposed as an explanation for the distinctive African AIDS epidemic. We investigate this hypothesis using longitudinal data collected in rural Malawi during 1998 and 2001 in combination with fixed-effect analyses. Our study finds important effects of social interactions for changes in individuals' AIDS risk perceptions and attitudes towards prevention strategies. However, these effects differ across regions. In Rumphi, social interactions are found to constrain opportunities for behavioral change; in Balaka and Mchinji, social interactions facilitate individual's adoption of risk-prevention strategies and changes in AIDS risk perceptions. We suggest that these differential effects of social interactions are caused by regional differences in the marriage pattern and the formation of local social networks.