The concept of Positive Deviance for behavior and social change caught my attention immediately because it is closely related to my specialty at work - quality improvement. As a quality improvement specialist, I can identify an area for improvement, conduct a root-cause analysis, identify potential improvement strategies, and spread successful strategies. Rather than beginning with identifying a problem, issue, or barrier, positive deviance focuses on an unexpected, sustainable success, studies the root of the success, and spreads the strategies in areas that are not as successful.
Positive Deviance is based on the observation that in every community there are certain individuals or groups (the positive deviants), whose uncommon but successful behaviors or strategies enable them to find better solutions to a problem than their peers. These individuals or groups have access to exactly the same resources and face the same challenges and obstacles as their peers1 (1www.positivedeviance.org).
The approach enables the community to discover existing solutions to complex problems within the community. I will use this approach as I begin to identify potential concepts for an alternative housing plan for the LGBT elder community.
To learn more about Positive Deviance,go to:
http://www.positivedeviance.org/about_pdi/index.html
I like this concept a lot. Good choice of reading for your project.
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