DISASTER PREPAREDNESS IN THE UNITED STATES

By

Belinda White

A Project

Presented to

The Faculty of Humboldt State University

In Partial Fulfillment

Of the Requirements for the Degree

Master of Arts

Sociology

December 2007
 DISASTER PREPAREDNESS IN THE UNITED STATES

HUMBOLDT STATE UNIVERSITY

By

Belinda White

Approved by the Master's Thesis Committee:

Elizabeth Watson, Major Professor Date

Judith Little, Committee Member Date

Jennifer Eichstedt, Committee Member Date

Jennifer Eichstedt, Graduate Coordinator Date

Chris A. Hopper, Interim Dean Date

Research, Graduate Studies & International Programs
 ABSTRACT

In 2005, the Humboldt County Red Cross Chapter offered me an internship with

their organization. My responsibility entailed starting a Red Cross Club at one of our

local High Schools and preparing a manual for future Red Cross efforts to work with

local youth. This work was informed by evaluation data on disaster preparedness

education and training. In addition, I worked with Humboldt State University staff to

evaluate a Community emergency Response Training Program, developing a survey

instrument and developing a report.

iii
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This project would not have been possible without the support and guidance of

my professors, friends and family. I would like to start by acknowledging Dr. Mary

Virnoche who has approved and been supportive of my past projects as well as this one.

I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Betsy Watson, my mentor, who has been a source

of inspiration to me. Dr. Watson’s guidance and advice throughout my time as a student

in the Master’s program and in the classroom are invaluable. Further, I would like to

acknowledge Dr. Judith Little, Dr Jennifer Eichstedt, and Dr. Samuel Oliner. I have the

deepest respect and admiration for their professionalism, outstanding knowledge of the

field of Sociology and dedication to excellence in teaching fascinating but difficult

subjects. I want to thank my friend and fellow Graduate student Gisela Rutishauser-

Chappelle who has provided me with guidance and collegial support. I also want to

acknowledge and thank Cynthia Werner for her effort in formatting this literature review

and helping to keep me on track with deadlines and formalities. Lastly, I would like to

thank my son’s Shannon and Kyle for providing me with love and emotional support.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT....................................................................................................................... iii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS............................................................................................... iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS.................................................................................................... v

LITERATURE REVIEW OF DISASTER PREPAREDNESS IN THE UNITED

STATES.................................................................................................................. 1

Preface..................................................................................................................... 1

INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................................. 2

COMMUNICATION CHANNELS ................................................................................... 4

RISK COMMUNICATION PROCESS ............................................................................. 6

PRECIEVED THREATS.................................................................................................. 10

HOUSEHOLD AND COMMUNITY PREPAREDNESS ............................................... 14

IMPEDIMENTS TO PREPAREDNESS.......................................................................... 17

RACIAL ETHNICITY AND IMPEDIMENTS TO PREPAREDNESS.......................... 21

GENDER ISSUES AND PREPAREDNESS ................................................................... 24

CONCLUSION................................................................................................................. 30

RECOMMENDATIONS.................................................................................................. 34

FINAL NOTES................................................................................................................. 38

BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................................. 40

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 LITERATURE REVIEW OF

DISASTER PREPAREDNESS IN THE UNITED STATES

Preface

This literature review of disaster preparedness will introduce the reader to the

available research done on disasters and the world of disaster preparedness education, its

success and its failures. The section on Communication Channels discusses the risks

involved in communicating successfully the warnings and their perceived risks and

threats to those involved. Research will show how individual, household and community

stability can be undermined by impediments to clear communication of risks and

warnings. The ability to receive and fully understand emergency preparation and actual

emergency warnings is affected by an individual or group’s social location:

marginalization of poor and disabled, women who care for children or the elderly, and by

race and ethnicity policy at the local state and federal levels. The basis of my findings

will be set out as well as recommendations for further study in this area.

1
 INTRODUCTION

In response to the widespread devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina, many

people have called for strengthening the federal government’s involvement in responding

to catastrophic emergencies. However, despite the billions of taxpayer dollars spent every

year on emergency preparedness and disaster cleanup, the United States still lacks an

overall disaster plan. According to Brian Friel and colleagues “no one has undertaken a

comprehensive federal effort to assess [the] gaps or to encourage experts in the many

disciplines of science and engineering associated with natural hazards to work together to

try to minimize the damage that disasters can inflict”. (Friel, et al.2005). This literature

review will serve to state the knowledge already affirmed in the available journal articles

and books, including what is known about disasters, their resulting damage and which

recovery methods lead to successful or unsuccessful outcomes in the daily lives of

disaster victims. It will also discuss preparedness education and training needed to protect

the public and their property. It will question the role of government policies in light of

the constitutional rights of individuals to be protected during natural or man-made

disasters.

The American landscape is vast, stretching from the Canadian border to the

border of Mexico and from the East coast to the West coast. Because of its natural,

climatic and geographic diversity, The U.S. is exposed to a wide range of natural hazards,

such as hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, forest fires and tsunamis as well as the

continuing threat of terrorism and other technological and biological threats. These risks

2
 3

are combined with increased population densities, aging populations, and the

development of dams and flood plains, as well as other vulnerable areas.

 COMMUNICATION CHANNELS

According to the German sociologist Ulrich Beck (1992) we live in a “risk

society,” in which the media play an essential role in the public’s decision-making. These

gatekeepers construct, amplify, dramatize or minimize risks, but most experts in the field

of emergency management agree that the primary source of information for the general

public about natural disasters is the mass media (Fisher, 1996). Media coverage helps to

raise disaster awareness among different populations, and for that reason, it can be used

to develop better contingency plans. As a consequence, the information provided by the

mass media is perceived as directly responsible for a decrease in casualties and material

losses related to natural hazards over the years. This claim assumes that people's

perception of disaster situations and their response to them depends heavily on the

content of the media and the accuracy of the information presented, more than with other

factors.

In Natural Hazards in Puerto Rico: Attitudes, Experience, and Behavior of

Homeowners (1993) Risa Palm and Michael Hodgson say that the media may not be

serving the role of effective educator, as the officials in crisis management tend to

believe. According to the authors, the media play only a secondary role in the

development of a risk perception and disaster awareness among certain communities.

This could be explained by the fact that the mass media provide standardized messages to

a wide and heterogeneous audience, composed most of the time by populations with

different cultural backgrounds, customs, traditions and perceptions of reality. These

4
 5
standardized messages cannot appeal to the singular reality of each community, which

may have different exposure to different hazards.

 RISK COMMUNICATION PROCESS

Clearly one of the most significant impediments to disaster planning is the low

priority of disasters in people’s lives and, as a result, the public may not be exposed much

to preparedness information or may put off taking action. According to the authors,

Mileti, et. al., (1993) research on risk communication shows a process which involves

source and message characteristics such as source credibility, repetition, frequency of

repetition, specificity, type and number of channels used to disseminate information. The

media has become one of the impediments to preparedness with the uncertainty about the

accuracy and credibility of messages because of the blurring of the line between actual

news and entertainment “news” about movie/TV celebrities.

The article “Response to Disaster: Fact Versus Fiction” shows that there are a

number of variables that will determine if the population at large will seriously consider a

warning message and will take appropriate action (Fischer, 1994). For example, the

clarity of the message, its consistency and frequency, the presence and “respectability” of

officials that are providing the warning, the accuracy of past warnings, and the frequency

of the hazard will have a significant impact on the credibility of the message and on

individual response.

Some research documents the idea that people may not receive accurate

information or may not trust the information they do receive due to language and/or

cultural and class differences. It has been noted that disaster related information may not

6
 7
reach all individuals in a targeted area unless it is presented in an understandable way

through the same channels that non-English speakers use in routine situations. (Perry,

Lindell, and Green, 1981). Disaster preparedness and response can be further

complicated if appropriate translators are not immediately or conveniently available or if

the messages are incorrectly transmitted as a result of dialect variations within the same

language group (Perry et al., 1981).

Other research documents the idea that source credibility poses additional barriers

to disaster preparedness. Members of the pubic may understand the messages being

conveyed, however, their trust in the reliability and accuracy of warnings and in the

sources that provide such information may significantly impact their behavior and

responses (Lindell and Perry, 2004). For example, Slovic (1991) in “Perceived Risk,

Trust and the Politics of Nuclear Waste” says that public confidence and trust in the

sources that provide such information as weather forecasts and warnings has an impact

on their perception of risk. Slovic points out that the limited effectiveness of risk-

communication efforts can be attributed to the lack of trust. If trust is lacking, no form or

process of communication will be satisfactory. Trust in institutions is a variable entity,

often a function of minority status and power (Perry and Greene, 1982). At times trust is

undermined by mass media accounts that convey inaccurate and biased information

(Wenger, et. al., 1980).

Lindell and Perry (2004) explain that media messages vary in their content,

especially their information about a hazard and its impact. Characteristics such as

magnitude, location, and time of impact have potential personal consequences such as
 8
likelihood of casualties, property damage, and social disruption. According to Lindell and

Perry, receivers of information differ in many respects, the most important of these are

psychological characteristics that have direct effects on the communication process. For

example, receivers differ in their perceptions of source credibility, access to

communication channels, prior beliefs about hazards and protective actions, ability to

understand and remember message content, and access to resources needed to implement

protective action (Lindell & Perry, 2004). There are many requirements for successful

communication of actual threat such as time, effort, skill, working tools and equipment,

and cooperation from others. Media messages vary in terms of their style (clarity,

forcefulness, and speed of delivery, use of figurative or humorous language), inclusions

and omissions (whether or not to include one’s own weak arguments, address opponents’

arguments, or to rely on implicit or explicit conclusions), ordering of message content,

and amount of message material (McGuire, 1985).

There seems to be considerable disagreement in the field of crisis management

and risk communication about the role of mass media and its ability to educate the public

about risk communication. Quarantelli in “The Future is Not the Past Repeated:

Projecting Disasters in the 21st Century from Current Trends,” thinks the mass media are

significant agents in the creation of risk perception and disaster awareness in the general

global population because of their continuously increasing capacity to "quickly produce

and distribute information" (Quarantelli, 1996). Thus, the media coverage of natural

disaster situations is the direct cause of the creation and improvement of contingency

plans in most countries because they direct and focus public attention on the issue of
 9
vulnerability against natural hazards. The dramatism with which the TV networks,

newspapers, and other media portray natural disasters helps people to realize how

vulnerable their society is and how necessary it is to create mitigation plans.

 PRECIEVED THREATS

To understand how the public prepares for disasters one must first understand

how the public perceives risk information. Substantial research has been devoted to risk

perception factors (Ropeik and Slovic, 2003) that include individual’s perception of

threat severity and their sense of control (the extent to which individuals feel some

efficacy over the threat). Other issues pertinent to risk perceptions include: does it affect

children, is the risk novel or new, and what is the risk probability (can it happen to me?).

To LaFoutanin (2004) risk perception factors are overestimating small risk and

underestimating large ones. For example, people are concerned about airline safety

because airplane crashes are spectacular, rare events. On the other hand, car accidents

seem less frightening because, to the general public, they are less catastrophic, more

commonplace events. Although the risk of death from a car crash is considerably larger

than that from an airplane crash, far more attention is paid to the airplane crash.

There are several myths about public response to crisis warnings, including the

belief that people are confused if given too much information, that ''crying wolf'' leads to

inaction, and that people automatically follow instructions. Other research into risk

perception has highlighted how the genders react differently. For example, white males

perceive risks as much smaller and much more acceptable than other groups do, while

women are more likely than men to seek out information from the media and then take

responsibility for adapting in a crisis.

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 11
David Ropeik & Slovic (2003) researchers who specializes in studying how

people interpret risks, believe humans subconsciously “decide,” based more on emotional

than factual information, on being too afraid of a lesser risk or not afraid enough of the

bigger ones. For instance, it is assumed that people will change their behavior if they

understand the risks involved, but according to the authors, behavior change is not that

simple. There have been widespread educational campaigns about the health risks of

behaviors like smoking, tanning, and eating too much, however, many people continue to

engage in these activities. Obviously there is a deeper issue to understanding risk

involving more than just statistical probabilities. Ropeik& Slovic suggest that our

perceptions of personal risk are based not only on a rational understanding of the facts

but also on a psychological reaction. Several psychological factors influence how we

respond to risk information. They are as follows:

• Control. People tend to feel the harm is lower if they are in control of a situation.

Many people choose to travel by car rather than plane, even though the risk of an

accident is higher with driving than flying.

• Trust. People tend to be more afraid of a risk if we don’t trust our source of

information or the officials who are supposed to protect us.

• Dread. The more dreadful a particular method of dying is, the more likely there is

to fear it. For example, death by shark attack evokes more fear than death by heart

attack, though the latter is far more likely.

• Risk versus benefit. The more benefit perceived in a given activity, the more

people downplay the risk of that activity. Many lifestyle choices, such as
 12
overeating, smoking, and drinking, have unconscious benefits. The result is an

increase our risk of heart disease and cancer by doing so.

• Personal connection. People may not feel that they are at high risk of a given

disease if told that one in 100 people will develop it, but perceptions of risk will

change if told those 100 people are in the same workplace.

Lindell and Perry (2004) found another factor contributing to perceptions of

hazards, and most often cited by researchers, is previous experience with a hazardous

event. Most people would expect that when one personally has experience with a natural

hazard event it would be more meaningful and lead to heightened perception of risk

(Burton, 1964). Anderson (1969) found that individuals who had recently experienced a

natural hazard were more sensitive to warnings and more likely to respond. Similarly,

Turner, Nigg & Heller-Paz (1986) showed that earthquake experience attracts attention

and heightens concern, although it is short lived.

Personalizing risk appears to be an important link between knowing about a

hazard and taking self-protective action. Most but not all studies have found significant

correlations between risk perceptions and the willingness to adopt hazard adjustments

(Lindell and Perry, 2000). For example, Turner and colleagues (1986) in Waiting for

Disaster: Earthquake Watch in California found seismic preparedness was significantly

higher among those who had heard, understood, and personalized the risk than among

those who had not. Again, focusing on earthquake thereat, Showalter (1993) found

statistically significant effects of concern about thereat of death and injury on all

protective responses except insurances purchases.

 13
The literature contains some contradictory findings. For example, Lindell and

Perry found (2000) that experience with natural hazards can work to lower perceived risk

associated with future events. Windham (1977) studied evacuation in response to

hurricanes on the Gulf Coast, reporting that sizable portions of the people who failed to

evacuate were long-time residents of an area that had previously experienced hurricane

impact. Similarly, Halpern-Felsher (2001) found that individuals who have experienced a

natural hazard perceive that they are less susceptible to harm from future events than their

less experienced counterparts.

Grima, (1980) in Improving Risk Information Transfer: Instrumental and

Integrative Approaches explains that perception of risk is important because it affects the

decision-making process, where rationality, facts and scientific certainty should lead the

debate. According to Grima, improving risk information transfer would result in more

realistic risk perception and ultimately lead to better risk management. Biased risk

perception can be costly, causing misallocation of resources. If the media present the

risks in the right frame and also win the trust of their public, people may be stimulated to

perceive risk with less bias and will be more likely to support sound risk policies instead

of wasting resources preventing minuscule dangers (LaFoutain, 2004).

There appears to be some overlap among the findings, still there is a great deal of

debate left pertaining to risk behavior research. Public perception of risk is an important

predictor of how citizens will prepare for and respond to hazard threats. Furthermore,

because the public is increasingly less involved in planning and policy decision-making,

perceptions of risk can influence the content of hazard mitigation programs.

 HOUSEHOLD AND COMMUNITY PREPAREDNESS

In this section of the literature review we will examine the factors associated with

household and community level preparedness. Factors associated with household and

community disaster preparedness behavior includes a range of measures and activities,

including developing house disaster response plans, learning about evacuation routes and

procedures, and knowing how to undertake expedient emergency measures such as

boarding up windows when a hurricane threatens or shutting off gas lines during an

earthquake.

According to Drabek (1986) and Trost & Hultaker (1983), the family has long

been considered a fundamental unit in the study of disaster behavior. As a core social unit

enhancing its member’s survival, researchers have long recognized the family unit as a

critical element in the understanding and prediction of disaster behavior. (Clason, 1983).

Even though there appears to be genuine concern and understanding for the place of the

‘family’ in disaster studies (Hultaker, 1985) and there exist ample materials on how

families should prepare for disasters, little research exists on the behavior of families in

terms of disaster preparedness. The sparse research that does exits has focused primarily

on the traditional family unit, thus ignoring non-traditional social units which now are in

the majority. Lindell and Perry (2004) agree that research on preparedness information

has yielded very little knowledge on what seem to be major predictors on how

preparedness and response activities are undertaken across various social units. One

which has been identified though is “prior” disaster experience. At the individual and

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 15
household levels, studies have shown experience with actual events as having a generally

positive impact on the willingness to prepare for future disasters (Lindell and Perry,

2000).

At the community level, an extensive survey of the literature (Drabek 1986) found

that the greater the frequency that communities experience disasters, the more extensive

will be their disaster panning efforts. Lending support to this research Sattler and

colleagues’ studies in 2000 on disaster survivors found higher levels of preparedness

among social units with extensive disaster experience. Drawing on the work from

“Health Psychology” by Paton et al (2003) have suggested that other factors may also

mediate the link among risk perception and intentions to take self-protective measures,

and subsequent adoption of those measures. Two of these factors that are particularly

relevant to the present study are personalizing risk and sense of community.

In the research literature, most but not all studies have found that personalizing

risk appears to be an important link between knowing about a hazard and taking self-

protective action (Lindell and Perry, 2000). For example, Turner, Nigg and Heller Paz

(1986) found seismic preparedness was significantly higher among those who had heard,

understood, and personalized the risk than among those who had not. Although findings

from a number of other studies have also supported this idea, few literary sources

contained contradictory findings. For example, (Rusell et al, 1995) found that a high

level of personal concern, measured as having frequent thoughts about earthquakes

significantly predicated mitigation and preparedness behaviors occurred in only a small

proportion of their analyses. For example, while people may be generally concerned
 16
about a hazard, particularly after a disaster event or after receiving hazard-related

information, the salience of the hazard in one’s life may well decline in the face of other

more daily concerns unless a potential threat is re-emphasized through interaction. These

factors can be explained in Lindell and Prater’s (2000) findings that past hazardous event

significantly predicted hazard adjustments even when risk perception did not.

McMillan & Chavis (1986) described those with a strong sense of community as

possessing feelings of belongingness and attachment to a place, or a sense of shared

history and connection with other members of their community. This bond to one’s

community has been found to have a variety of positive psychological consequences. For

example, Davidson & Cotter (1991) found that a stronger sense of community was

associated with greater feelings of subjective well-being, including less worry and higher

levels of perceived self-efficacy. According to Prezza & Costantini (1998), people are

more likely to develop and follow through on solutions to their problems and to feel

greater self-confidence when there is a stronger bond to their community. A strong sense

of community has also been found to reduce perceptions of risk regarding the incidence

of crime in urban neighborhoods (Kim, Mackin & Schweitzer, 1997). In the context of

hazards research various measures of community attachment including home ownership,

having school age children, being married, and having lived longer in the community

were factors found to have a positive impact on preparedness levels (Turner, et al 1986).
 IMPEDIMENTS TO PREPAREDNESS

There is a large body of research on household disaster preparedness in terms of

what impedes individual and community preparedness and what works. By looking at

the issue of vulnerability we see a key factor in the study of disaster research in terms of

impediments to preparedness. Vulnerability in terms of disaster research refers to the

likelihood that particular individuals in a community will suffer injuries, deaths or

property damage from a hazardous event; it is a measure of how well prepared and

equipped the community is to avoid or cope with such events. Some factors that increase

vulnerability include population growth, increasing population density and concentration

of wealth, poor land-use policies, aging populations and infrastructure, a lack of

knowledge about local hazards and a lack of standards enforcement and effective

monitoring systems. In “Disasters, Development and Vulnerability" by Twigg (2006), the

degree to which a community allows itself to be vulnerable to natural hazards defines

their level of risk. However, people who live in marginalized and compromised

neighborhoods may not be able to prepare as well as those who live in more affluent

sections of the country.

In the research of Betty Morrow (1999), disaster vulnerability is seen as a

fundamentally socially constructed phenomena. That is to say, one’s disaster

vulnerability matches one’s social location within society. Using U.S. demographic

trends and looking specifically at disasters such as Hurricane Andrew, Betty Morrow

illustrates how certain categories of people, such as the poor, elderly, and others

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considered at risk are living in the most vulnerable areas and therefore are at greater risk

when disaster strikes. Marrow notes that “knowledge of where these groups are

concentrated within communities and the general nature of their circumstance is an

important step towards effective emergency management.” (1999 P 1)

Following along with the same school of thought that the results of disasters are

socially constructed, Walter Peacock and colleagues analyze the consequences of conflict

and competition especially associated with race, ethnicity and gender in “Hurricane

Andrew: Ethnicity.” (1999). These researchers also agree that lower-income and minority

groups face higher constraints in their struggle for recovery. The article explores how

social, economic and political factors set the stage for Hurricane Andrew by influencing

who was prepared, who was hit the hardest, and who was most likely to recover. The

authors also view preparations for and reactions to disasters as social events, and discuss

how they are organized and how scarce resources such as housing are dispersed. This

work is helpful in the understanding of disaster literature because disasters are not just

seen as natural physical phenomena that impact individuals and communities. For these

authors, disasters are inherently social events. The nature of our communities, how they

are organized and how scarce resources such as housing are distributed, are critical

factors for understanding disaster impact and recovery.

Another consideration of the term vulnerability, or what makes people vulnerable

to disasters, requires an understanding of the circumstances that place people and

particular localities at increased risk. From a social science perspective, circumstances

 19
that contribute to individual and infrastructure risk range from economic factors to the

basic characteristics of individual behavior. The most apparent factors are the economic

pressures that force many of the poor to live in cheap but dangerous locations such as the

New Orleans’ Ninth Ward District where low income and people of color are forced to

reside. “Poor people” live in the areas that they do because these areas are available to

them after better off people have located themselves. Typically, wealthy people are on

high ground, leaving the lower and more vulnerable areas to the poorer folks.

Sociologist Robert Bolin who specializes in disaster research at Arizona State

University challenges the classical view that disasters originate outside the social

system—that they are caused by acts of God or nature. According to Bolin, “there is [a]

tendency for many academic researchers to consider events as natural occurrences caused

by some exceptional force of nature temporarily disrupting an otherwise ‘normal’

community.” (Bolin, 1998: 2) Bolin has called for an approach to studying hazards that

sees disasters and their impacts as resulting form social and political-economic factors

that shape both the vulnerability of “built” environment to disaster damage and the social

vulnerability of some populations. For Bolin:

Vulnerability concerns the complex of social, economic and political

considerations in which people’s everyday lives are embedded and that
structure the choices and options they have in the face of environmental
hazards. The most vulnerable are typically those with the fewest choices,
those whose lives are constrained, for example, by discrimination, political
powerlessness, physical disability, lack of education and employment,
illness, the absence of legal rights, and other historically grounded
practices of domination and marginalization. (1998: 9-10)
 20
In order to reduce vulnerability, Robert Bolin says that it “requires expanded

understanding of the ways societies unevenly allocate the environmental risks and the

social and political commitments to promote greater economic equity and environmental

justice.” (2006 P 27)

 RACIAL ETHNICITY AND IMPEDIMENTS TO PREPAREDNESS

Authors Perry and Lindell in “Citizens Knowledge of Volcano threats at Mt. Saint

Helens”(1990) have documented various ways in which social demographics and social

cultural factors affect both the recipient of risk information and the channels that people

choose to use in the acquisition of hazard information they receive. Although the research

focusing specifically on racial and ethnic factors in disaster preparedness and response

are still rare in the literature, some studies have been conducted that focus specifically on

minorities. The authors note that racial and ethnic differences influence threat perception,

concern about hazards, understanding of and belief in the science underlying hazard

information, and attitudes towards the agencies disseminating information on

preparedness. They also found that most minority members obtain their information on

hazards from sources different from those used by members of the dominant group

(usually through kinship networks like extended family or local community

organizations). With respect to threat perception, minority group members differ from the

majority in their access to preparedness and other emergency relevant information as well

as their responses. These differences are attributed in part to language and income issues:

Minorities experience greater relative difficulties than whites because they

have lower incomes and financial reserves, are more likely to be
unemployed, less likely to have disaster insurance, and more likely to have
problems in communicating with institutional providers of both
information about disaster risks and post-impact relief (Lindell and Perry,
1992: 142).

Issues involving ethnicity and hazard perception in the research literature are still

quite rare, but need to be addressed.

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 22
Furthermore, the authors suggest there is a significant difference among the

channels individuals use and prefer to use when disseminating disaster preparedness

information. In terms of communication sources in the community, sources can be

categorized as authorities, news media, and peers. These sources are judged in terms of

their credibility, which is a combination of expertise and trustworthiness. Perceptions of

credibility vary depending upon whether a source is speaking about hazards or hazard

adjustments. Official sources are generally the most credible. People look for sources to

have impressive credentials, previous experience, or the respect of others (Perry &

Lindell, 1990). Ethnic minorities trust different types of sources. Research has focused on

the perceptions that Mexican Americans, African Americans, and Caucasians have of

source characteristics. Authorities (particularly firefighters and members of the police

department) tend to be regarded as credible by the majority of all three ethnic groups

(Lindell and Perry, 1992). African Americans and Caucasians tend to be more skeptical

of the mass media than Mexican Americans. In general, Mexican Americans are more

likely than other groups to consider peers to be the most credible sources.

Perry and Nelson (1991) found that various ethnic groups differ in the

communication channels they prefer to use. Race and ethnicity are indicators for sub-

cultural traits that impact information received. For example, different ethnic groups use

different information channels to receive information, speak different languages, and are

exposed to different risk levels. Even within the same cultural group, individuals vary in

their risk awareness depending on how long they have lived in an area, their previous

personal experience with local hazard conditions (Palm, 1993), the socio-economic and
 23
political context of the community affected and the nature of the hazard. Unfortunately,

these aspects are often disregarded by the literature in risk communication.

 GENDER ISSUES AND PREPAREDNESS

It has only been in the last decade or so, that researchers have begun to study

gender vulnerability in disasters. Gender is an important aspect of socially constructed

situations. In most of the recent literature on gender vulnerability, women are often

portrayed as more vulnerable to hazards because of their role as caregiver and because

women are more likely to live in poverty. This care-giving role involves them in

activities that make them more vulnerable to disaster such as earthquakes, collapse of

buildings, flash flooding and lightening (Fothergill, 1998).

Fothergill’s research (1998) uses a feminist lens to explore how disasters

specifically affect the lives of women. Fothergill’s work is an important contribution to

disaster literature because it informs the reader about the vulnerability of women in

disaster. She offers insight into the emotional and physical trauma that women suffered

during and after disaster, their feelings of loss, and the importance of class, race, and,

sexual orientation in their disaster recovery.

Looking at other research on gender vulnerability, Elaina Enarson and Betty

Morrow in the “The Gendered Terrain of Disaster” discuss the importance of adopting a

“gendered perspective” when studying disaster-related phenomena.

The social experience of disaster affirms, reflects, disrupts, and otherwise

engages gendered social relationships, practices, and institutions. Disasters
unfold in these highly gendered social systems. Disaster management is
correspondingly engendered, shaping the environmental decisions we
make and contingencies we fail to plan for, the dynamics of our disaster
management organizations and relief operations, the disaster-responding
household and emergent response groups, the decision makers we choose
and the heroes we create. (Enarson and Morrow, 1998)

24
 25
They found in their research that hazard-related gender issues span a range

of role-related concerns and feel strongly that gender issues should not be ignored

or dismissed if we are interested in reducing vulnerability and to increasing

sustainability of communities.

In “Gender and Natural Disasters,” Elaina Enarson explains that women are made

more vulnerable to disasters through their socially constructed roles. As Enarson states

“..gender shapes the social worlds within which natural events occur” (Enarson P. 4)

According to Enarson, women have less access to resources such as social networks and

influence, transportation, information, skills (including literacy), control over land and

other economic resources, personal mobility, secure housing and employment, freedom

from violence and control over decision-making, that are essential in disaster

preparedness, mitigation and rehabilitation.

Women are also at increased risk because of the gendered division of labor. They

are over-represented in the agriculture industry, self-employment and the informal

economy, in under-paid jobs with little security and no benefits such as healthcare or

union representation. The informal and agricultural sectors are usually the most impacted

by natural disasters, thus women become over-represented among the unemployed

following a disaster (Enarson).

Because women are primarily responsible for domestic duties such as childcare

and care for the elderly or disabled, they are less able to migrate to look for work

following a disaster. According to Enarson, when men migrate, they leave behind very

high numbers of female-heads of households. The failure to recognize this reality and the
 26
failure to take into account women’s double burden of productive and reproductive labor,

means that women’s visibility in society remains low, and attention to their

needs remains inadequate.

Taking into account that housing is often destroyed in the disasters, many families

are forced to relocate to shelters where there are inadequate facilities for simple daily

tasks such as cooking; this only increases women’s domestic duties or “burdens”

considerably, thus leaving women less freedom and mobility to look for alternative

sources of income. As a result, women’s economic resources are taken away or

diminished drastically (Enarson, 2000).

The advent of a disaster can increase women’s vulnerability in a number of ways.

Aside from the increase in female-headed households and that the majority of shelter

residents are women, numerous studies have shown an increase in levels of domestic and

sexual violence following disasters (Enarson, 1998). As one of the primary aspects of

women’s health in particular, reproductive and sexual health are beginning to be

recognized as key components of disaster relief efforts. However, attention to them

remains inadequate and women’s health suffers disproportionately as a result.

Unlike mainstream disaster research, these articles use a feminist

perspective to present findings about women’s experiences during and after a

disaster. Feminist scholarship is helping to move the field of disaster research

forward by drawing attention to the social impacts of disasters on women as well

as social degradation. As a result of this research, social networks are developing

that look at women’s issues in disasters like the grassroots women’s organizations
 27
responding to disasters in Central America, India, and Turkey. In addition links

between antiviolence women’s organizations in California and British Columbia

convened during the summer of 2005 to help inspire a Canadian Conference with

a strong focus on the mitigation of violence against women in disasters. The

United Nations’ Division for the Advancement for Women, in preparation for the

World Summit on Sustainable Development conducted an Expert Working Group

on Environmental Management and Mitigation of Natural Disasters. A gendered

perspective has resulted in new intellectual and social networks among gender

and disaster researchers and activist, and new writing on gender and disaster from

around the globe.

In the last decade or so disaster sociologists have been focusing on

gendered disaster behavior. Although the literature is a bit sparse in this area of

study, the literature that emphasizes the role of women in disaster is important

according to Alice Fothergill (1996) because women are more vulnerable to

hazards than men both because of their role-related responsibilities and because of

their greater tendency to be living in poverty (Fothergill, 1996, 1998). To support

this argument, a number of studies conducted in developing countries have found

that women and girls are more susceptible to the effects of famine and drought,

(Bolin, et al 1998) during disasters because of male/female inequalities. For

example, it has been found that when food is scarce, it is usually the women who

receive less adequate rations, therefore, resulting in higher rates of female

mortality (Bolin, et al 1999). It has also been noted in the literature that women
 28
are more at risk during earth quake shaking as they react to protect and comfort

their children, while men’s vulnerability may stem from their greater tendency to

try to run out of buildings (Bourque, Russell, and Goltz, 1993). Also noted in the

research literature, women’s perception of risk is different than men’s.

The literature shows that women tend to be more risk adverse than men and more

likely to try to prepare for disasters and take self protective measures such as evacuation

action. (Bateman and Edwards, 2002). Women more than men were found to have

responded positively to earthquake aftershock warnings on virtually every indicator from

seeking out more information to securing household items and developing family

emergency plans (O’Brien and Atchison, 1998). Lindell and Prater (2000), replicating

previous studies, found that women had higher levels of seismic risk perception than

men. Men and women also appear to respond differently in both the warning and impact

phases of disasters. Women more than men, give credence to warnings and want to

evacuate in the face of impending threat. (Drabeck, 1969). In terms of preparedness

behavior, the literature also shows that women seek out hazard information more than

men. They volunteer and take part in local preparedness programs, (e.g. in schools) and

in community organizations addressing local environmental or technological hazards

more often then men (Fothergill, 1996). Although gender disaster research is offering a

new perspective on how men and women prepare and respond to disasters, more disaster

research needs to focus on the differences among women in differing social locations.

Across the globe, gender response toward disasters tends to be ignored or in isolation.

Illegal women migrants in many countries are considered culturally invisible by virtue of
 29
racism and their undocumented status (Bolin and Standford, 1998) and this invisibility

extends to studies of vulnerability. In the richer nations, however, women’s vulnerability

to disasters is being explored and new perspectives on hazards, risk, and disaster are

beginning to emerge across the globe as the frequency and impacts of natural disaster

increase (Blaikie et al. 1994). Cutting across this new trajectory are also new angles of

vision on women and men as embodied and gendered actors in a gender-ordered world.

Feminist scholarship and networks that have been developing over the last

decades have moved the field of disaster research forward. Throughout the 1990’s,

disastrous events provided ample opportunities for research to explore gender themes in

case studies, among them studies of gender relations in California earthquakes,

hurricanes in the US, Central America, and the Caribbean, major flooding in Pakistan,

persistent drought and dramatic earthquakes and cyclones in India, and many more. A

major study of the 1985 Mexico City earthquake (Massolos and Schteingart 1992)

explicitly examined women’s vulnerabilities and their political mobilization around relief

and reconstruction issues; their work, however, needs to be translated from Spanish to

other languages and circulated more widely.

 CONCLUSION

In response to the widespread devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina, many

people have called for strengthening the federal government’s involvement in responding

to catastrophic emergencies. Despite the billions of taxpayer dollars spent every year on

emergency preparedness and disaster cleanup, the United States still lacks an overall

disaster plan. The hurricanes of 2004 and 2005 demonstrated that the Federal

Government became ineffective and overwhelmed, leaving thousands stranded and on

their own without food and water for days waiting for relief response. Looking back on

the devastation Katrina wrought, we see that relief efforts would not have been possible

without the support and dedication of thousands of individual volunteers and staff across

the country, including volunteers who themselves were displaced or suffering because of

the storms. In order to be better prepared as a nation, we all must do our part to plan for

disasters. All individuals can decrease the impact of a disaster by taking steps to prepare

before an event occurs. Members of the pubic may understand the messages being

conveyed, however, their trust in the reliability and accuracy of warnings and in the

sources that provide such information may significantly impact their behavior and

responses. The information provided by the mass media is perceived as directly

responsible for a decrease of casualties and material losses related to natural hazards over

the years. This implies the assumption that people's perception of disaster situations, and

their response to them depends heavily on the content of the media and the accuracy of

the information presented, more than on other factors. Other research has documented

30
 31
various ways in which social demographics and social cultural factors affect both the

recipient of risk information and the channels that people choose to use in the acquisition

of hazard information they receive.

Ropeik a researcher who specializes in studying how people interpret risks,

believes humans subconsciously “decide,” based more on emotional than factual

information, on being too afraid of a lesser risk or not afraid enough of the bigger ones.

Most studies have found that personalizing risk appears to be an important link between

knowing about a hazard and taking self-protective action (Lindell and Perry, 2000).

There is a large body of research on household disaster preparedness in terms of

what impedes individual preparedness and what works. The degree to which

communities allow themselves to be vulnerable to natural hazards defines their level of

risk. There seems to be considerable disagreement in the field of crisis management and

risk communication about role of mass media and its ability to educate the public about

risk community. Peacock suggests that disasters are socially constructed and the

consequences of conflict and competition are associated with race, ethnicity, gender, low-

income and minority groups face higher constraints in their struggle for recovery.

In the last decade or so disaster sociologists have been focusing on gendered

disaster behavior. Although the literature is a bit spars in this area of study, Alice

Fothergill (1998) believes women are more vulnerable to hazards than men both because

of their role-related responsibilities and because of their greater tendency to be living in

poverty. To support this argument, a number of studies conducted in developing

 32
countries have found that women and girls are more susceptible to the effects of famine

and drought, during disasters because of male/female inequalities

Quarantelli (1996) uses the example of the Mexico City earthquake to show how

vulnerable industrialized countries lack preparedness for national disaster. This

understanding of human vulnerability provokes citizens' involvement and participation in

the demands for safety and preparedness from their national governments, encouraging

the creation and improvement of official mitigation plans. In the field of risk

communication some studies have touched on the issues of how individuals perceive the

media. There is no consensus in the literature about how individuals perceive the media

content and further research is needed in order to determine what channels are needed to

be most effective in reaching different segments of the population and encouraging them

to prepare.

Consistent with the literature of social attachments and relationships, the key

predictor of the disaster preparedness is community connectedness, measured in various

ways has been shown to foster adaptive behavior during both the pre- and post-disaster

periods. Community bonds defined as neighborhood tenure, identification of the

neighborhood as home, participation in community organizations and the presence of

friends and relatives near by is significantly correlated with preparedness. As noted above

family ties and other forms of social involvement are key factors in the preparedness and

response behaviors. This is an example of Grannover’s theory of the ‘Strength of Weak

Ties’. By having many superficial relationships within the general neighborhood, people

are more likely to ‘get the word’ about disasters or warning updates.
 33
Enarson and Morrow (2000) research looks at specific disaster experiences from

around the world. Their research is beneficial to disaster literature because it argues for a

gendered perspective in policy, practice and research. Across the globe key research

questions, methodologies and population samples of disaster social science are

determinedly male oriented or male dominated. Based on this predominate view, a shift

in gender perspective would make a difference in how and what’s accounted for. In terms

of gender issues, men and women could proposes new political coalitions, new strategies

for mitigating priorities during disaster relief, and new research methodologies.
 RECOMMENDATIONS

Based on the data provided in this literature review, it becomes evident that the

federal government must spearhead efforts to create a national disaster relief program.

While the program must be uniformly established by the federal government, it must be

implemented through the development and support of state and local governments. The

mobilization of state and particularly local governments will help ensure that emergency

and disaster preparedness will help to provide all populations with needed support in

times of national crisis. This recommendation for change requires that administrative

control be applied at the federal level, while specific programs for preparedness be

developed and implemented at the state and local levels. Considering first the

administrative actions that must be taken on the part of the federal government, the

following are recommended to create a uniform system of disaster preparedness and

relief:

• The federal government should mandate specific types of communications to be

utilized based on the type of disaster and the nature of the problem. For instance, a

terrorist attack may warrant a full scale media plan that provides individuals in

affected areas with information about the disaster and individuals in outlying areas

with specific information on relief efforts. Uniformity in creating media coverage of

disaster events must be established in this program.

• The federal government must establish clear standards for states in creating

emergency and disaster planning services. Standards must include requirements for

34
 35
states to meet in providing all citizens with necessary resources in the event of

different types of emergencies. The specific programs that will be utilized by state

and local governments will vary, depending on the needs of the population and

available resources. The goal is to establish comprehensive standards for emergency

preparedness that must be met by all state governments.

• Financial support for helping states develop emergency preparedness and disaster

plans must be provided. Once individual states have developed a plan for emergency

preparedness, the federal government must provide funding and support for the

development of these plans.

While action at the federal level will help ensure that the administration of a

national emergency preparedness and disaster relief program are established, state and

federal governments will provide the backbone for implementation. With respect to state

governments, these institutions should be placed in the role of overseeing local

government initiatives to implement federal guidelines. State governments will need to

review local plans to ensure that they meet federal guidelines for emergency preparedness

and disaster relief. In addition, state governments would be responsible for allocating

monies needed for the implementation of measures required of federal guidelines. Monies

would be allocated based on need with metropolitan areas receiving more funds for

meeting citizen needs in times of crisis.

At the local level, those in charge of meeting federal mandates would be required

to enact policies that protect citizens in the event of a crisis or allow for disaster relief if

needed. Specifically, this level of government would be responsible for developing all
 36
necessary resources for information dissemination, protection of citizens and disaster

relief. This process may require the construction of facilities to meet emergency response

needs or the development of infrastructure that allows for the dissemination of

information at the local or “street” level. Local government will be responsible for

meeting federal standards through the development of concrete policies that achieve

emergency preparedness and disaster relief standards established by the federal

government.

The establishment of a federal emergency preparedness and disaster relief

program is essential to improving outcomes in the event of a national emergency.

Concurrently with efforts to create a national program of preparedness, federal, state and

local governments should also engage in educational campaigns to raise awareness about

the potential threat of emergencies and the need for disaster preparedness. These

educational campaigns could be carried out much in the same way that public health

campaigns are initiated. For instance, when public health officials identify a specific

health threat that can impact the health and well being of the population, efforts to raise

awareness are made through the development of media attention and coverage of the

issue. Education and prevention are typically stressed as the focal points of providing

information.

In much the same way that public health officials disseminate information, so too

should disaster preparedness experts. This information should be focused on the

education of the public, with the intent of raising awareness about potential threats and

what can be done to improve outcomes in the event of a disaster. Efforts to facilitate
 37
public education will need to take place on both a state and local level. Information such

as where to go and how to acquire information in the event of a disaster or crisis should

be stressed. This information will help citizens improve overall response when an

emergency or crisis situation arise requiring citizen action. Just as the types of disasters

vary in different communities and regions, so do population demographics. A special

needs assessment can be a helpful tool for communities to prepare at-risk populations for

natural disasters. This special needs assessment can address helping people living with

disabilities, or who live in low lying areas, in different sub–cultures and linguistic groups

prepare for natural disasters and thereby reduce the likelihood of loss from disasters.
 FINAL NOTES

Along with my volunteer work with Red Cross and various other organizations,

and projects I have worked for and on, it has come to my attention that there is much

needed research on the behavior of citizen preparedness. We can learn lessons from

mistakes made in hurricanes Rita and Katrina. How we can take steps to prevent disasters

is an important topic for future research, but insights can be gleaned both from the

disaster literature and other anecdotal personal interviews with actual victims, social

workers and governmental policy advisors.

I recommend that there be more research conducted into the issues surrounding

the 12 million undocumented workers in this country and disaster preparedness. In order

to be better prepared as a nation, we all must do our part to plan for disasters. All

individuals can decrease the impact of a disaster by taking steps to prepare before an

event occurs. The research shows that disaster preparedness education and training

provide individuals and communities with a better understanding about how to prevent

the loss of life. Acquiring the knowledge about disasters demands hands on training to

understand what occurs before, during and after a disaster and is vital to building a strong

barrier to the effects of the disaster on people and property. The apparent chaos and

threatening nature of disasters as unusual, uncontrollable, and many times unpredictable

events has facilitated the development of organizational means to restore order and

normalcy. In the last decade or so, losses from disasters have continued to escalate, both

in the U.S. and worldwide. In the last ten years, 4777 natural (not technological or

38
 39
industrial) disasters have occurred, killing more than 880,000 people. In addition they

have affected the property, health, and jobs of about 1.9 billion people and inflicted

economic losses of around $685 billion to the world's economies. Somewhere in the

world a disaster occurs almost daily that requires international assistance for affected

populations.
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