@article {bnh-8380, title = {Using videos in floods and bushfires to educate, signal risk, and promote protective action in the community}, journal = {Safety Science}, volume = {164}, year = {2023}, month = {04/2023}, abstract = {

Videos are commonly used by emergency services agencies in natural hazard emergencies to communicate to the public about the hazard, its possible risks, and to promote protective action. To evaluate the efficacy of the videos being disseminated and amplified during an event, this research examined the extent to which different types of videos trigger risk perceptions, promote protective action, and improve knowledge about the hazard and impact. The findings suggest a video containing a smaller number of facts is most useful at impacting the public{\textquoteright}s hazard knowledge, visualisations (real-life or infographics) of facts helps improve knowledge, and videos highlighting the impact an emergency is having (or had) through people{\textquoteright}s experiences helped improve hazard knowledge, risk perceptions, and protective action intentions. Finally, while footage of a bushfire triggers threat perceptions and some coping appraisal, the style is not as useful for building hazard knowledge. The research extends visual risk literacy knowledge and offers practical guidance for agencies operating in high-risk environments seeking to achieve behavioural compliance. The research argues videos will continue to be an important tool in the public information and warning milieu for any risk event.

}, keywords = {bushfires, Floods, Hazard knowledge, Risk perception, Visual communication, wildfires}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssci.2023.106166}, url = {https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S092575352300108X?token=E04DACC8FEDBF7004C50FE7FE1D497A53312A572F2594F14129DBAA7AEB2CA157658D01EDBA569E71D658B294138AA15\&originRegion=us-east-1\&originCreation=20230508003157}, author = {Paula Dootson and Erica Kuligowski and Scott Murray} } @article {bnh-8306, title = {Consistent and conflicting information in floods and bushfires impact risk information seeking, risk perceptions, and protective action intentions}, journal = {International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction}, year = {2022}, month = {01/2022}, abstract = {

A core challenge for emergency services agencies is encouraging people to take protective action in a noisy, information-rich environment. This challenge is heightened when the environment is filled with conflicting information. While investigations of conflicting information are prevalent in temporally distant health contexts such as smoking cessation, where the effects of the protective action (i.e., quitting) take years to be realised, studies have yet to examine the impact of conflicting information when the potential outcome of the protective action (e.g., saving your life) has greater temporal immediacy. In this study we compare how social cues (media, peers, commercial weather forecaster) and environmental cues (weather conditions) that are consistent/conflict with an emergency warning message, impact community risk information processing, risk perceptions, and protective action intentions. The research finds risk perception is higher and intention to undertake protective action and information sharing is more likely when there is consistency between the emergency warning message and the socio-environmental cues, whereas heuristic information processing, self-efficacy, and information seeking are more likely to occur in the presence of conflicting cues. The research moves beyond high-level discourse about conflicting information {\textquoteleft}causing confusion{\textquoteright} in the community to a more nuanced, empirical understanding of the complexities of conflicting information across multiple stages of the decision-making process, in a context with greater temporal immediacy for action. Practical suggestions are made for agencies managing conflicting information when the conflict comes from socio-environmental cues. Future research is warranted for replication and to test mitigation strategies for conflicting information.

}, keywords = {decision-making, emergency service, information, protective action}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2021.102774}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2212420921007354}, author = {Paula Dootson and Erica Kuligowski and Dominique A Greer and Sophie A Miller and Vivienne Tippett} }