Understanding perceptions of changing hurricane strength along the US Gulf coast

Abstract

The scientific debate on the impact of climate change on hurricane intensity/strength continues. Regardless of its causes, the consequence of increasing hurricane intensity is undeniably immense among coastal residents. In this study, we investigate how various objective measures of hurricane strength affect people's perception of changing hurricane strength over time. We utilize original survey data to examine the relationship between perceived and actual shift in hurricane strength. In this article, hurricane strength is indicated as maximum wind speed at landfall, storm surge, and economic damage. We find that the characteristics of hurricane strength associated with the most recent landfall are much more closely associated with perceptions of changing hurricane strength than objectively measured trends. This result is consistent with availability bias, suggesting that perceptions are associated with most accessible and retrievable events. We also find that people's belief in climate change play a powerful role in one's perception of changing hurricane strength. Political predispositions are found to affect one's perceptions of changing hurricane strength. Compared to Democrats and Independents, Republicans are far less likely to believe that climate is changing and thus they tend to not believe that hurricanes are becoming stronger. Given that this study focuses on how physical characteristics of past hurricane events influence individual perceptions of hurricane strength shift, future research should focus on how expectations of future climate and weather‐related events influence individual attitudes and behaviours.

Predicting support for flood mitigation based on flood insurance purchase behavior

“…To investigate how flood insurance purchase behavior influences individuals' mitigation policy support among the US Gulf Coast residents, we use a comprehensive climate change survey for all coastal counties in the Gulf Coast in 2012 (SM 1). In addition to flood insurance purchase behaviors, the survey includes various questions related to socio-demographic characteristics, perceptions of local climate change, and perceptions of flood-related hazards that may affect mitigation behavior/intention [28][29][30][31][32]. We construct an interconnected Bayesian Network (BN) model to study how these variables jointly affect the support for flood mitigation.…”

“…The obtained BN can be considered as being composed of three layers. The first layer includes socio-demographic variables, which are considered as explanatory factors in hazard mitigation behavior models because they indicate individuals' social vulnerability to hazards [46], as well as different risk perceptions [30,47] and knowledge possessed by different socio-demographic groups [48]. We also consider the geographic context represented by the percentage of land area of the Special Flood Hazard Area (SFHA) 6 per county.…”

Should We Leave? Attitudes towards Relocation in Response to Sea Level Rise

“…While we hypothesized such a linkage, the direction of effects still deserves investigation. Flood experience could increase people's likelihood to take mitigation measures [26,41,42], there is also evidence that past experience does not contribute to a higher level of intention to take self-protective actions [28,43].…”

Examining the Effects of Objective Hurricane Risks and Community Resilience on Risk Perceptions of Hurricanes at the County Level in the U.S. Gulf Coast: An Innovative Approach

“…Maximum wind speed and peak storm surge height associated with the last hurricane landfall can shape coastal residents' perceptions of changing hurricane strength (Shao et al 2017a).…”

“…Therefore, examining perceptions towards hurricane-related risks can provide policy makers with insights into mitigation/adaptation policy support and public willingness to take follow-up actions. Risk perceptions are socially constructed and can be influenced by various factors such as past experiences of natural hazards (Shao 2016;Shao and Goidel 2016;Shao et al 2017a), social relations, emotional reactions to risky situations, group cultural values, and community ways of life (Douglas and Wildavsky 1983;Hertwig et al 2004;Weber and Stern 2011;Loewenstein et al 2013;Weber and Hsee 1998).…”