Dialogue Boxes: A Tool for Collaborative Process Evaluation

Abstract

Process evaluation is now a core component of health promotion program evaluations. Over the past decade, considerable attention and resources were devoted to developing sensitive and collaborative process evaluation methodologies. These efforts share the broad commitments that process evaluation should (a) support program goals and objectives, (b) lead to program improvement, and (c) whenever possible, develop evaluation capacity among participants. This article describes dialogue boxes, a process evaluation tool that has proven extremely useful in diverse health promotion program and planning efforts. The tool itself is described, along with eight lessons learned about the power of this seemingly simple evaluation method, comments about the challenges of this type of process evaluation, and tips for using dialogue boxes in health promotion planning and programs.