Comprehension of pictures in educational materials on HIV/AIDS

Abstract

The article reports on a research project that was aimed at determining differences in picture comprehension between literate and low-literate audiences in the context of HIV and AIDS. Structured interviews were held with 30 low-literate and 25 literate adult speakers from African languages. The responses were coded, and analysed. Although metaphorical pictures proved to be problematic for both literates and low-literates the low-literate group was more inclined towards literal interpretation of pictorial metaphors, and culturally encoded meanings seemed to obfuscate the meaning of certain commonly used mass media symbols. Pictures containing symbolic-abstract components posed particular problems for the low-literates, and interpretation problems were compounded by poor legibility, complexity and an unclear figure-ground distinction.

Die artikel doen verslag oor 'n navorsingsprojek wat daarop gerig was om verskille te bepaal tussen geskoolde en laaggeskoolde lesers se begrip van illustrasies binne die konteks van MIV en vigs. Gestruktureerde onderhoude is gevoer met 30 laaggeskoolde en 25 geskoolde volwassse sprekers van Afrikatale. Die response is gekodeer, en geanaliseer. Hoewel metaforiese illustrasies problematies was vir sowel geskooldes as laaggeskooldes, was die laaggeskoolde groep meer daartoe geneig om visuele metafore letterlik te interpreteer, en dit het geblyk dat kultureel geënkodeerde betekenisse die betekenisse van algemeen bekende massamediasimbole beïnvloed het. Dit is veral afbeeldings met simbolies-abstrakte komponente wat vir laaggeskooldes problematies was, en interpretasieprobleme is vererger deur swak leesbaarheid, kompleksiteit en 'n onhelder onderskeid tussen voor- en agtergrond.