Adolescence spreads between the age of 10 and19 years. Many physical, physiological and emotional changes occur at this age both in boys and girls, leading to adjustment within and as members of family, peer group, school and thereby society at large. In India, reproductive health status is inextricably bound up with social, cultural, and economic factors that influence all aspects of lives. As defined by WHO, Reproductive health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. It addresses reproductive or sexual health, hygiene, reproductive processes, functions and system at all stages of life. Adolescents aged between 10–19 years account for more than one-fifth of the world's population. In India, this age group forms 21.4 percent of the total population (National Youth Policy 2000), which is almost a quarter of the population. Despite of this, the health needs of adolescents have neither been researched nor addressed adequately; particularly their reproductive health needs are often misunderstood, unrecognized or underestimated. In this context, Adolescent Reproductive Health (ARH) has gained importance in the field of health education. Entertainment education, which is contextually called as edutainment as it provides education as well as entertainment, is an effective approach for bringing behavioural change. But limited materials are available on ARH messages for tribal adolescent girls. The present experimental study was conducted with an objective to accomplish and assess edutainment material developed for the study. ARH issues relevant to adolescent girls were identified and content analysis was done with 30 experts. Edutainment material both in print and electronic multimedia form were developed and executed in four tribal schools of Adilabad district to analyse the enhancement of health communication. Print material was in a form of hand book entitled Kishora Balikala Arogya Karadeepika (Health manual for adolescent girls). In electronic material, sub-topicwise power point presentación was done with animations and video, to support effective presentation of the content to the sample. Results revealed a significant difference at (1%) level of probability both in terms of information and influence on ARH communication. Effectiveness of the print and electronic material was calculated and found all the indicators as effective.
ARH, Edutainment materials
