The Science.
Evidence-based communication strategy — known in the academic literature as Entertainment-Education (EE) — is the deliberate design of entertainment content to achieve measurable social change outcomes.
Documented outcomes across 50+ countries.
Over 50 years of evidence. Recognized by the CDC, SAMHSA, UNICEF, and WHO. Applied in television, radio, and digital media — and, at RHP, live theatre.
Founded by
Miguel Sabido
Mexican theater director and theoretician. Developed EE methodology at Televisa in the 1970s. Recognized as the father of EE.
The research behind the stage.
Albert Bandura — Social Cognitive Theory
Stanford — one of the most cited psychologists in history
- Core insight: people learn behaviors through observation of others — including fictional others.
- Three mechanisms: observational learning, self-efficacy ("I can do this"), and outcome expectations ("here's what happens").
- Why live theatre is distinct: the audience and the character share air. The parasocial relationship isn't mediated by a screen — this may make live performance uniquely powerful for SCT-based behavior change.
Arvind Singhal & Everett Rogers
Integration of Sabido + Bandura + Diffusion of Innovations
- Key contribution: a comprehensive entertainment-education framework combining Sabido, Bandura, and Diffusion of Innovations.
- Talk value: EE content sparks interpersonal conversation, driving second-order diffusion of change beyond direct audience exposure.
- Why it matters for RHP: a production seen by 200 people generates conversations that reach 2,000. Impact isn't bounded by the seats in the room.
Melanie Green & Timothy Brock
Narrative Transportation-Imagery Model
- Core mechanism: when audiences are cognitively, emotionally, and imagistically absorbed in a story — transported — their real-world beliefs shift toward the story's implied beliefs.
- Five pathways: reduced counterarguing, character connections, mental imagery, emotional engagement, and story causality.
Emily Moyer-Gusé
Entertainment Overcoming Resistance Model (EORM)
- Three resistance mechanisms: reactance ("don't tell me what to do"), counterarguing ("I disagree with that"), perceived invulnerability ("that doesn't apply to me").
- How entertainment defeats all three: masked persuasive intent reduces reactance, character identification blocks counterarguing, character similarity overcomes invulnerability.
- Theatre bypasses the defenses that protect people from feeling told what to do.
Combined frameworks.
Formative research
Singhal & Rogers
Who is the audience, what do they believe, where are they on the journey?
Character design
Sabido
Positive, negative, and transitional archetypes assigned to the production.
Theatrical craft
Green / EORM
Transportation through quality storytelling, reduction of resistance.
Parasocial relationship
Bandura
Self-efficacy and outcome expectations absorbed through identification.
Post-show dialogue
Talk value
Ripple effects through community conversation.
Evaluation
Sabido / Singhal
Validated instruments measure outcomes, informing the next production.
A global track record.
Documented outcomes across Mexico, Ethiopia, India, Myanmar, South Africa, Brazil, and 50+ countries worldwide.
American applications
East Los High (Hulu, Population Media Center) — Latina/o sexual and reproductive health. Superstore (NBC) — undocumented immigrant experience. Grey's Anatomy / Desperate Housewives health storylines (CDC / Hollywood, Health & Society).
RHP's contribution
Applying EE to live community theatre — with its irreducible intimacy, presence, and participatory potential — in a specific neighborhood with specific communities.
Measuring what changes.
Validated instruments — resistance, engagement, identification, similarity, and transportation — form the core of RHP's post-show audience survey. Together, they map the EE causal chain: how transported was the audience, how strongly did they identify, how successfully did the story overcome resistance, and what self-efficacy and attitude change resulted?
The engagement hierarchy.
Napoli's synthesis of the Harmony Institute's engagement hierarchy provides a practical taxonomy of audience engagement from passive to active. For live theatre, RHP adapts this hierarchy as follows:
- Attendance
- Website views
- Social media follows
- Post-show verbal comment
- Social media share / mention
- User review
- Petition view
- Talkback participation
- Program sign-up
- Inviting others
- Volunteering
- Donating
- Civic organizing
- Contacting public officials
- Joining advocacy efforts
Napoli, P.M. (2014). Measuring Media Impact: An Overview of the Field. Norman Lear Center Media Impact Project. Derived from Harmony Institute (2013b) engagement continuum.
The coalition model.
David Whiteman's coalition model argues that focusing only on individual audience members can miss where a production's real impact takes root.
Three ways it broadens the lens
Incorporating the entire production process, not just the finished work. Moving beyond individual audience members to relevant social movements, advocacy networks, and organizational partners. Considering impact on discourse outside the mainstream, including alternative and community-based spheres.
Stakeholder mapping at RHP
Before each production opens, RHP asks: who are the organizations, movements, and networks relevant to this production's theme? What happened in those networks during and after the run?
Research citations.
The frameworks above draw on a body of peer-reviewed and foundational scholarship in entertainment-education, narrative persuasion, and media impact measurement.
- Bandura, A. (1986). Social Foundations of Thought and Action: A Social Cognitive Theory. Prentice-Hall.
- Sabido, M. (1970s). Entertainment-Education methodology. Developed at Televisa, Mexico.
- Singhal, A. & Rogers, E.M. (1999). Entertainment-Education: A Communication Strategy for Social Change. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
- Green, M.C. & Brock, T.C. (2000). The role of transportation in the persuasiveness of public narratives. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79(5), 701–721.
- Green, M.C. & Brock, T.C. (2002). In the mind's eye: Transportation-imagery model of narrative persuasion. In M.C. Green, J.J. Strange, & T.C. Brock (Eds.), Narrative Impact. Lawrence Erlbaum.
- Moyer-Gusé, E. (2008). Toward a theory of entertainment persuasion: Understanding the effects of entertainment-education. Communication Theory, 18(3), 407–425.
- Whiteman, D. (2004). Out of the theater and into the streets: A coalition model of entertainment-education. In A. Singhal, M.J. Cody, E.M. Rogers, & M. Sabido (Eds.), Entertainment-Education and Social Change. Lawrence Erlbaum.
- Napoli, P.M. (2014). Measuring Media Impact: An Overview of the Field. Norman Lear Center Media Impact Project.
- Harmony Institute (2013). Engagement continuum. In Measuring Media Impact.
See it in practice.
Discover how these frameworks shape our productions on the Southwest Denver stage.