Sociodemographic predictors of residents worry about contaminated sites

© 2018 Elsevier B.V. The management and remediation of contaminated environments increasingly involves engagement with affected local residents. Of late, risk communication tools and guidelines have drawn attention to the stress and concern of residents as a result of heightened awareness of localised contamination and the need to address these less visible impacts of contamination when engaging with affected communities. Despite this emerging focus, there is an absence of research exploring the factors that predict resident worry about neighbourhood contamination. This paper aims to address this shortcoming by drawing on data from a cross-sectional survey of 2009 adult residents in neighbourhoods near 13 contaminated sites across Australia. Ordered logistic regression was used to determine the sociodemographic, environmental, and knowledge-based factors that influence residents’ degree of worry. The findings suggest age, gender and income significantly affect residents’ degree of worry. Being knowledgeable about the contaminant and having a stronger perception of a sense of place within a particular neighbourhood were associated with lower degrees of worry. Type of contaminant also impacted resident worry, with residents being less likely to worry about solvents and metals than other types of contaminants. Our analyses suggest resident worry can be reduced through improving access to accurate information and the development of specific risk reduction strategies tailored to each neighbourhood and aimed at the heterogeneous distribution of worry amongst residential populations

Extreme weather, complex spaces and diverse rural places: An intra-community scale analysis of responses to storm events in rural Scotland, UK

The impacts that increasing rural demographic and socio-cultural diversity has had upon the responses of rural community members to weather-related hazard events has remained relatively understudied within the Disaster Risk Reduction scholarship. Drawing upon interview evidence obtained from a study of three rural communities in Scotland, UK, the article explores how variation in length of residence amongst community members affects abilities to cope during periods of extreme weather, with long-term residence being associated with more positive outcomes than more recent in-migration. The article suggests that differences in responses between long-term residents and more recent in-migrants results from a complex array of differences in exposure to previous storm events, differences in occupational backgrounds that result in differences in ways of relating to the land, and differences in social relationship preferences and expectations. The article makes the claim that policies and practices of Disaster Risk Reduction, including the Scottish Community Resilience initiatives, need to focus more on the intra-community scale in rural settings in order to better protect residents from the risks that extreme weather poses to human well-being. In their present form, Scottish Community Resilience initiatives are likely to be limited in their ability to improve the storm-coping abilities of residents because their implementation at the whole-community scale reflects outdated assumptions about the character of rural communities and ignores the impacts of several decades of demographic change. The findings also raise questions about how the knowledge that enables successful adaptation to environmental hazard events can be effectively mobilised within increasingly complex and diverse societies

Planning for health in higher density living: learning from the experience of Green Square, New South Wales

Urban densification proceeds apace. However, and notwithstanding a renewed awareness of the intrinsic link between urban form and human health, we are only beginning to query the impact of higher density living on health-supportive behaviours. Using Green Square, Sydney as a case study, this paper reports recent research that addresses this gap. Findings include a consistency – though largely unrecognized – with the healthy built environments research literature; a lack of a consistent ‘healthy environments’ language, including any definition of ‘healthy density’; a lack of attention to high-rise high density; and a need for an active engagement with complexity, as well as substantial and ongoing institutional support.Output Status: Forthcoming/Available Onlin

Transforming knowledge systems for life on Earth: Visions of future systems and how to get there

© 2020 The Author(s) Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge systems might need to look like and how we might get there. Findings suggest that envisioned future systems will need to be much more collaborative, open, diverse, egalitarian, and able to work with values and systemic issues. They will also need to go beyond producing knowledge about our world to generating wisdom about how to act within it. To get to envisioned systems we will need to rapidly scale methodological innovations, connect innovators, and creatively accelerate learning about working with intractable challenges. We will also need to create new funding schemes, a global knowledge commons, and challenge deeply held assumptions. To genuinely be a creative force in supporting longevity of human and non-human life on our planet, the shift in knowledge systems will probably need to be at the scale of the enlightenment and speed of the scientific and technological revolution accompanying the second World War. This will require bold and strategic action from governments, scientists, civic society and sustained transformational intent