Participatory methods for
vulnerability assessments:
Selected examples
Gina Ziervogel
Stockholm Environment Institute
Overview
Introduction
Toolkit
Examples
Wealth ranking
Cognitive mapping
Role play
at the start..
What aspects are important
Field-based data
How to measure
Toolkit
Number of tools for vulnerability and
adaptation assessments
Quantitative vs. qualitative
Time available
Resources
Wealth ranking
Stratifications of groups within a community
as understood by community members
Categories
Money, availability/access to resources,
health, labour
Poor, average, better-off
Represented by colours, symbols, numbers
Wealth ranking process
Establish categories
Community members place themselves/
key members place households
Consultation possible
Cognitive mapping
A cognitive model that captures diverse
nature of the problem
Useful tool when:
different stakeholders have different
perceptions of the problem
the options for addressing a problem are
unclear
Cognitive mapping process
1) State the problem
2) Brainstorm assumptions and solutions
3) Group emerging concepts
Build up a hierarchy/topology
4) Re-illustrate the concepts so they form a
conceptual model
5) Go back to participants
6) Formal cognitive model
Role play
To creatively remove people from their usual
roles and assumptions by involving them as a
group in analytic thinking and assessment
Role play process
Open-ended story/ written case description
Describe the setting for the action
Participants
asked to act out potential
scenarios
Record
Tape/video
Participant feedback
Observer descriptions/notes
Summary
A way of going beyond the initial perceptions
of both the researcher and the researched
Participatory tools need to be moulded to suit
the problem