scholarly journals Can We Apply the Psychology of Risk Perception to Increase Earthquake Preparation?

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Iris Lok ◽  
Evan Eschelmuller ◽  
Terje Haukaas ◽  
Carlos Ventura ◽  
Armin Bebamzadeh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Analysis ◽  
Risk Perception ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Risk Mitigation ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Emotional Reactions ◽  
Effective Strategy ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Local School

Can we encourage people to prepare for a natural disaster by altering the way that scientific information about risk is presented? In assessing the risk posed by a particular hazard, people tend to be guided more strongly by their emotional reactions than by logical or statistical analysis; human beings are driven to protect themselves from risks that that they have actually experienced, that are easy to envision, or that are linked to vivid, concrete images. Thus, even if people recognize that earthquakes pose an important threat, they may be unmotivated to take action to prepare for this abstract risk in the absence of direct personal experience. Harnessing past research and theorizing, we developed a novel intervention to transform scientific information into vivid, emotionally evocative imagery. In a pre-registered study, 411 participants were shown publicly available statistics or a vivid, scientifically-grounded image of what a local school would look like after a major earthquake. When invited to sign a petition to make schools safer, 77.3% participants agreed after looking at the image compared to 68% who agreed after looking at statistics. These findings suggest that using vivid images to communicate scientific information can be an effective strategy for motivating people to support risk mitigation initiatives.

scholarly journals Communicating risk in human-wildlife interactions: How stories and images move minds

PLoS ONE ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (12) ◽  
pp. e0244440
Author(s):  
Sara K. Guenther ◽  
Elizabeth A. Shanahan
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Risk Perception ◽  
Habitat Restoration ◽  
Risk Mitigation ◽  
Process Analysis ◽  
Affective Response ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Emotional Reactions ◽  
Communicating Risk ◽  
Prior Attitudes

Effectively communicating risk is critical to reducing conflict in human-wildlife interactions. Using a survey experiment fielded in the midst of contentious public debate over flying fox management in urban and suburban areas of Australia, we find that stories with characters (i.e., narratives) are more effective than descriptive information at mobilizing support for different forms of bat management, including legal protection, relocation, and habitat restoration. We use conditional process analysis to show that narratives, particularly with accompanying images, are effective because they cause emotional reactions that influence risk perception, which in turn drives public opinion about strategies for risk mitigation. We find that prior attitudes towards bats matter in how narrative messages are received, in particular in how strongly they generate shifts in affective response, risk perception, and public opinion. Our results suggest that those with warm prior attitudes towards bats report greater support for bat dispersal when they perceive impacts from bats to be more likely, while those with cool priors report greater support for bat protection when they perceive impacts from bats to be more positive, revealing 1) potential opportunities for targeted messaging to boost public buy-in of proposals to manage risks associated with human-wildlife interactions, and 2) potential vulnerabilities to disinformation regarding risk.

scholarly journals Mapping the Spatial-Temporal Dynamics of Vegetation Response Lag to Drought in a Semi-Arid Region

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (16) ◽  
pp. 1873 ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Hua ◽  
Huidong Wang ◽  
Haigang Sui ◽  
Brian Wardlow ◽  
Michael J. Hayes ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Vegetation Index ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Risk Mitigation ◽  
Scientific Information ◽  
Gaussian Function ◽  
Drought Risk ◽  
Severe Drought ◽  
Similar Response ◽  
Vegetation Types ◽  
Data Set

Drought, as an extreme climate event, affects the ecological environment for vegetation and agricultural production. Studies of the vegetative response to drought are paramount to providing scientific information for drought risk mitigation. In this paper, the spatial-temporal pattern of drought and the response lag of vegetation in Nebraska were analyzed from 2000 to 2015. Based on the long-term Daymet data set, the standard precipitation index (SPI) was computed to identify precipitation anomalies, and the Gaussian function was applied to obtain temperature anomalies. Vegetation anomaly was identified by dynamic time warping technique using a remote sensing Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) time series. Finally, multilayer correlation analysis was applied to obtain the response lag of different vegetation types. The results show that Nebraska suffered severe drought events in 2002 and 2012. The response lag of vegetation to drought typically ranged from 30 to 45 days varying for different vegetation types and human activities (water use and management). Grasslands had the shortest response lag (~35 days), while forests had the longest lag period (~48 days). For specific crop types, the response lag of winter wheat varied among different regions of Nebraska (35–45 days), while soybeans, corn and alfalfa had similar response lag times of approximately 40 days.

Minds and brains: angels, humans, and brutes

1982 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 309-315
Author(s):  
Mortimer J. Adler
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Animal Behavior ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Past ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Conceptual Thought ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Fine Print

✓ In his 1982 Cushing oration, a distinguished philosopher, author, and discerning critic presents a distillate of his phenomenally wide range of personal experience and his familiarity with the great books and teachers of the present and the past. He explores the differences and relationships between human beings, brute animals, and machines. Knowledge of the brain and nervous system contribute to the explanation of all aspects of animal behavior, intelligence, and mentality, but cannot completely explain human conceptual thought.

scholarly journals Factors predicting citizens’ risk tolerance regarding earthquakes

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Liv Henrich
Keyword(s):  
Risk Perception ◽  
Psychometric Properties ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Risk Mitigation ◽  
Risk Tolerance ◽  
Risk Characteristics ◽  
Tolerance Study ◽  
Measures Of Risk ◽  
The Government ◽  
Different Levels

<p>People tolerate different levels of risk from different hazards in their day-to-day life. Perceptions of risks and the amount of risk mitigation people desire for different hazards vary. Previous research shows that the psychometric properties of different hazards predict the level of risk people tolerate for various hazards, but not for earthquakes. Risk tolerance is likely to also be affected by factors other than the psychometric properties of hazards. This research tested how earthquakes score on psychometric risk properties compared to five other hazards, and aimed to replicate previous research on the risk factors predicting risk tolerance. Secondly, the research aimed to test if other factors, namely framing effects, risk perception and fatalistic thinking predict risk tolerance for earthquakes. In Study 1, participants from Wellington, New Zealand (N = 139) rated six different hazards (nuclear power, smoking, alcohol, driving, flying and earthquakes) on several risk characteristics and measures of risk tolerance. The results showed that the different hazards were perceived differently in terms of risk tolerance and that participants thought different risk mitigation actions were appropriate for the six hazards. Factor analysis showed that factors derived from risk characteristics did not predict risk tolerance. Study 2 (N = 173) assessed the effects of framing messages, risk perception and fatalism on risk tolerance (judgments about the firmness of the legislation; willingness to pay tax) and judgments about who should pay. The frames had an effect on participants’ concern about the risk, but did not affect the other measures. Generally participants thought that the Government should pay for strengthening buildings, however, those participants who perceived damage as preventable (fatalism measure) thought that private owners should pay for strengthening.</p>

Dynamics of Public Risk Perception and Media Coverage

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne-Kathrin Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Risk Perception ◽  
Demographic Change ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Personal Experience ◽  
Third Party ◽  
The Us ◽  
Public Risk

Many societal risks are beyond the scope of personal experience. Thus, people are increasingly dependent on third-party information to assess risks. This study examines the dynamics of public risk perception by focusing on the role of media coverage. It does so by comparing public opinion on selected societal risks, namely climate change, terrorism and demographic change over a 25-year period (1990–2015). The analysis examines risk perception in the US and Germany and provides valuable insights into how and why the public's assessment of risks differs in these countries.

Public Risk Perception Towards Power Generation by Municipal Waste Incineration

2020 ◽  
pp. 87-104
Author(s):  
Rui Zhao ◽  
Yuxin Huang ◽  
Yuyu Zhou ◽  
Meng Yang ◽  
Xinyue Liu
Keyword(s):  
Power Generation ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Risk Perception ◽  
Word Frequency ◽  
Risk Mitigation ◽  
Waste Incineration ◽  
Municipal Waste ◽  
Fuzzy Decision Making ◽  
Public Risk ◽  
Municipal Waste Incineration

Power generation by municipal waste incineration provides a template not only for waste reduction but also for energy recovery. However, incineration plants face considerably strong protests from local communities. In such context, this study investigates the public's risk perception towards an operating incineration plant by using a word-frequency-based decision making approach to provide insight into risk mitigation while enhancing public acceptance. An operating municipal waste plant located at Chengdu, Sichuan Province was used as a case study to examine the risk perception posed by the host communities. Face-to-face interviews through a structured questionnaire were applied to data collection. A word frequency analysis was used to identify the key factors that influence public's risk perception and construct a multi-attributive decision matrix for the risk assessment. Entropy-based fuzzy decision making was implemented to discriminate the risk semi-quantitatively. To alleviate possible conflicts, policy implications were given.

The Grace of Cattle in the Noble Quran: An Analytical Study

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 101
Author(s):  
Salahaldeen Mohammad AlBzour
Keyword(s):  
Statistical Analysis ◽  
Analytical Method ◽  
Analytical Study ◽  
Human Beings

Cattle are among the great graces that have been sent down and have been subjected for human beings and Allah has mentioned the cattle in His Noble Quran. It has been adopted in this research the analytical method that attempts to make use of statistical analysis of cattle as mentioned in the Noble Quran. Furthermore, the purposes of the current research are to bring to light the potential purposes of mentioning the cattle in the Noble Quran and to clear up how the place of revelation of the surahs could intensify the understanding of the verses. Anyway, the results come to light that cattle are not vainly mentioned in the Noble Quran and the main purpose of mentioning them is to show the benefits and lessons that human beings can get from them and then comes the rest of purposes respectively. Moreover, the results show that the place of revelation of the surahs cannot be ignored because it gives a great deal of understanding the context of the verses. Finally, the results display that it is sometimes necessary to refer to the preceding verse(s) or to the following one(s) to understand the purposes of mentioning the cattle and to understand the context of the verse.

scholarly journals A Comparative Analysis of Risk Perception and Coping Behaviors among Chinese Poultry Farmers Regarding Human and Poultry Infection with Avian Influenza

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (20) ◽  
pp. 3832 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bin Cui ◽  
Feifei Wang ◽  
Linda Dong-Ling Wang ◽  
Chengyun Pan ◽  
Jun Ke ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Risk Perception ◽  
Avian Influenza ◽  
Perceived Risk ◽  
Human Infection ◽  
Farm Size ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Coping Behaviors ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Poultry Farmers ◽  
And Coping

Poultry farmers face a dual risk when mutant avian influenza (AI) virus exhibits zoonotic characteristics. A/H5N1 and A/H7N9 are two principal strains of the AI virus that have captured public attention in recent years, as they have both been reported and can infect poultry and humans, respectively. Previous studies have focused either on poultry farmers’ risk perception and biosecurity preventive behaviors (BPBs) against A/H5N1 infection with poultry, or on their risk perception and personal protective behaviors (PPBs) against human infection with A/H7N9, even though these two strains often appear simultaneously. To bridge this research gap, a survey (N = 426) was conducted in the Chinese provinces of Jiangsu and Anhui to assess risk perception and coping behaviors adopted by poultry farmers facing the dual risk of these two viral strains. Paired sample t-tests revealed that farmers’ perceived risk of poultry infection with A/H5N1 was significantly higher than their perceived risk of human infection with A/H7N9, and that their reported frequency of BPBs against A/H5N1 was significantly higher than the frequency of PPBs against A/H7N9. Moreover, farmers were less familiar with AI infection in human beings compared to that in poultry, but they felt a higher sense of control regarding human AI infection. Multivariate regression analyses showed that farm size and perceived risks of both human and poultry infection with AI were positively associated with BPBs and PPBs. The findings of this research suggest that a campaign to spread knowledge about human AI infection among poultry farmers is needed, and that a policy incentive to encourage large-scale poultry farming could be effective in improving implementation of BPBs and PPBs.

Language in Education

1989 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-40
Author(s):  
Lawrence Moser
Keyword(s):  
Personal Experience ◽  
World View ◽  
Cognitive Structure ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The World ◽  
Oral Speech

Language is a way of communicating between people by the use of symbols, signs, writing and oral speech. Language is used in different ways in different communities, countries and cultures throughout the world. Lindfors (1980, p.43) suggests that language consists of three major components: Semantic, Syntatic and Phonological.Language is seen as being acquired by human beings through their own interaction with the environment that surrounds them. Human beings are able to build an overview of their language through personal experience, and also a cognitive structure developed from their world view.

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