Yes, we can: motivate Dutch citizens to engage in self-protective behavior with regard to flood risks

Although the risk of flooding poses a serious threat to the Dutch public, citizens are not very inclined to engage in self-protective behaviors. Current risk communication tries to enhance these self-protective behaviors among citizens, but is nonetheless not very successful. The level of citizens engaging in self-protective actions remains rather low. Therefore, this research strives to determine the factors that might enhance or lessen the intention to engage in self-protection among citizens. The study was a 2 (flood risk: high vs low) × 2 (efficacy beliefs: high vs low) between subject experiment. It was conducted to test how varying levels of flood risk and efficacy beliefs influence two different self-protective behaviors, namely information seeking and the intention to engage in risk mitigating or preventive behaviors. Furthermore, the relationship between information seeking and the intention to take self-protective actions was discussed. Results showed that high levels of flood risk lead to higher levels of both information seeking and the intention to engage in self-protective behaviors than low levels of flood risk. For efficacy beliefs, the same trend occurred. Also, results showed that information seeking seems to coincide with the intention to take preventive actions and acted as a mediator between the levels of perceived risk and efficacy and the intention to take self-protective actions

The time of telling tales: The determinants of effective risk communication

The aim of this thesis is to gain an in-depth understanding of self-protective behavior of citizens regarding real-life safety risks. With the increase of safety risks in our modern day society, the necessity of preparing citizens for possible risks and crises in their environment becomes more evident (Rickard et al., 2014). Insight in the conditions under which citizens are inclined to take self-protective measures is therefore needed. Since risk communication is a powerful tool used to increase self-protectiveness of citizens, this thesis also focuses on studying the way in which risk communication can be used as a means to enhance the self-protective behavior of at-risk populations. The main research question is: Which variables predict the self-protectiveness of citizens with regard to real-life safety risks and under which conditions is risk communication most effective in enhancing self-protective behavior? Overall, the results of this thesis show that risk communication is most effective when recommended risk mitigating actions can be viewed by the public as effective in mitigating the threat. Therefore, risk communication efforts need to focus primarily on communicating risk-mitigating options that the target audience perceives as useful. Providing citizens with the opportunity to practice these behaviors as well as emphasizing their own personal responsibility, are two options that might positively influence this perceived usefulness of risk mitigating options. Also, this thesis shows that citizens that have a positive social norm regarding safe behaviors, are more willing to engage in self-protectiveness. This stresses the need to incorporate social norm in current risk communication campaigns. Finally, since results show that citizens who receive multiple similar risk messages are more willing to engage in risk mitigating behavior in the short- and long-term, risk message repetition can be used in order to increase the self-protectiveness of the population

De Risk Factory: Onderzoek naar de effectiviteit van de Risk Factory

De Risk Factory is een veiligheidseducatiecentrum waar basisschoolleerlingen en groepen met een verhoogd veiligheidsrisico veiligheidsbewust worden gemaakt door realistische scenario’s aan den lijve te ondervinden. Het doel van de Risk Factory is om bezoekers kennis te geven van mogelijke veiligheidsrisico’s en de zelfredzaamheid van deze bezoekers te vergroten.  Dit onderzoek is erop gericht om te kijken in hoeverre een bezoek aan de Risk Factory bijdraagt aan de mate van zelfredzaamheid van bezoekers. Uit het onderzoek naar de effectiviteit van de Risk Factory blijkt dat een bezoek aan de Risk Factory leidt tot een hoog veiligheidsbewustzijn en een grotere intentie tot zelfredzaamheid onder kinderen uit groep 7 en 8 van de basisschool. De Risk Factory levert een belangrijke bijdrage aan het voorbereiden van kinderen op mogelijke onveilige situaties in de omgeving. Ondanks de positieve resultaten verkregen in dit onderzoek, is het nog wel van belang om na te gaan in hoeverre het ‘aan den lijve ondervinden’ van realistische scenario’s in de Risk Factory doorslaggevend is in het vergroten van de zelfredzaamheid. Het vergelijken van het effect van een bezoek aan de Risk Factory met het effect van ‘standaard’ voorlichtingsbijeenkomsten verdient daarom aanbeveling. &nbsp

The action suited to the word? Use of the framework of risk information seeking to understand risk-related behaviors.

Although a growing body of risk communication research focuses on how people process risk information, one question that is overlooked is how the seeking of information contributes to behavioral adaptation toward the risk issue. How are people’s behavioral responses to risks affected by the search for risk information? Building on the Framework of Risk Information Seeking (FRIS), this paper reports on two studies that focus on the experimental testing of several of the basic FRIS assumptions. In study 1, a 2 (involvement: high vs. low) × 2 (risk perception: high vs. low) between-subjects experiment was conducted to test the assumption that higher levels of involvement and risk perception stimulate the intention to seek additional risk information as well as the actual risk information. Study 2 is a partial replication of study 1. In study 2, a 2 (involvement: high vs. low) × 2 (fear appeal: present vs. absent) × 2 (response efficacy: high vs. low) between-subjects experiment was conducted to test how varying the levels of involvement, risk perception, and response efficacy influence actual and intended information seeking, as well as the intention to adopt risk-mitigating actions. The results showed that the high-involvement, high-risk perception, high-response efficacy group was most likely to actually seek information and make behavioral changes. The results are in accordance with basic FRIS assumptions. Implications for risk communication are discussed