Guiteras study finds that education alone is not sufficient to change unhealthy behaviors
A new study published in the journal Science by MPRC faculty associate Raymond Guiteras and colleagues James Levinsohn and Mushfiq Mobarak found that combining community education with subsidies to build hygienic latrines was the most effective way to increase latrine usage in an area of Bangladesh where open defecation is common. Reducing open defecation, which is practiced by about 15 percent of the world’s population, is key to improving public health and preventing about 280,000 deaths per year worldwide that are caused by poor sanitation. The study tested three different approaches for increasing the use of hygienic latrines. Community education programs alone had little effect, but latrine coverage expanded substantially when education was combined with subsidies to help low-income people cover the cost of building latrines. Even when only a few households were subsidized, latrine usage improved among unsubsidized neighbors.