| Abstract
| - In the Spring of 1987 a major public health education campaign on AIDS was co-ordinated by broadcasters and by the United Kingdom's Department of Health and Social Security. Initially a nationwide distribution of leaflets was followed by intensive television, radio, press and billboard advertising. Then in early March TV programmes (some of them sequences of three or four episodes) were run on Britain's four channels, with a goal of informing the entire adult public about the danger of AIDS, intending thereby to induce a widespread change in sexual behaviour. At the Independent Broadcasting Authority, responsible for the conduct of two television channels and a network of 45 local radio stations, two nationwide surveys were mounted to assess the effectiveness of the television programme campaign. While several dependent measures of assessment were formulated, including attitudes towards high-risk groups and sufferers, perception of risk levels, sexual behaviour and knowledge, this study focuses on knowledge and demonstrates that the programme campaign played a positive role in increasing knowledge. The discussion points out that such a gain may militate against behaviour change, possibly because increased knowledge is linked with perceptions of lower risk from AIDS.
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