Communicating with children and adolescents about the risk of natural disasters

Abstract

A vast number of people annually are affected by natural disasters. Children are at risk of losing their lives and suffer mentally or physically after such events. The fostering of resilience and preparedness ahead of disasters can reduce untoward effects of disastrous events. Risk communication and disaster education are considered important aspects of disaster preparedness, but little is known about whether such strategies influence children’s behaviour when natural disasters occur or how they cope in the aftermath. This paper presents and discusses various strategies that promote preparedness activities to save lives. To a minor extent, it also includes strategies that can promote coping in the aftermath. Strategies such as informational campaigns, educational activities, psychoeducation and parental guidance are addressed. The literature to date indicates that schools are a suitable arena for risk communication, and that adolescents themselves should be involved and engaged in the communication strategies. However, the relationship between knowledge of preparedness strategies and the resulting preparedness actions is largely unknown. It is unknown whether changes in awareness and attitudes have resulted in actual behaviour change. It is advocated that preparedness activities and parental involvement should supplement information-based strategies.

Risk Assessment of Crisis Management in Response to Natural Disasters with an Emphasis on Earthquakes

“…Strengthening flexibility, communication, and education is also one of the most important aspects of disaster preparedness. A good solution to the crisis is also to raise public awareness and attitudes by organizations involved, which is consistent with the current study [23].…”

“…Medical organizations critically need to take into account leadership, coordination, and decisionmaking, flexibility, expert teams, and multilateral relations so as to show urgent response to natural disasters, which is consistent with the current study [22]. Gunvor (2018) states that a large number of people are affected by natural disasters annually. Strengthening flexibility, communication, and education is also one of the most important aspects of disaster preparedness.…”

Breaking Through Barriers and Building Disaster Mental Resilience: A Case Study in the Aftermath of the 2015 Nepal Earthquakes

“…Although some level of understanding was reported by actors, communities only had minimal information. Disasters are associated with emotional challenges in affected communities and the inability to understand their reactions or know about current disaster plans may indeed impact their mental health [58].…”

“…Since large numbers of children are severely affected [82] during a disaster, effective risk communication before a disaster is thought to lessen the mental health impacts [58]. Information may be fostered before a disaster through psychoeducation in school or through parents and other channels like advertising campaigns and social media, from which they can have a sense of the emotional changes and be aware about what to expect during a disaster [58]. Risk communication to underprivileged communities should be planned accordingly by using the correct medium for communication.…”

Key Principles And Approaches In Geohazard Communication For Enhancing Disaster Resilience

“…The need to differentiate between different target audiences in terms of the types of information required and the methods of communication to be used is nothing new (e.g. McKirdy et al, 1998, Reynolds & Seeger, 2005Marker, 2008;Becker et al, 2015;Midtbust et al, 2018;and Doyle et al, 2019). In the geohazard context, it is useful to consider the potential range of different audiences in two main categories: those who need to be proactive in risk reduction such as engineers, planners and insurers; and those who would need to be reactive to any warnings that are given including developers, emergency services, the general public, and the media ( Table 1).…”