Presentation Transcript

1. Theory and Practice

   Teaching Natural Hazards and Disaster Communication

   Erik Brogt Jacqueline Dohaney University of Canterbury
2. Overview Why teach communication skills? The audience: Things to consider Initiatives at the University of Canterbury Preliminary results
3. Why teach Communication Skills? We typically don’t teach communication skills These are often adhoc, embedded, implicit (hidden) learning outcomes Communication is central to Disaster Risk Reduction principles
4. Why teach Communication Skills? 4. Consistently mentioned as a top skill needed for graduates “Social skills are really important in the job. You’ve got to be able to communicate with people. And that’s not just like at a professional level, it’s at a social level too. You’ve got to be able to sit down and have a drink with someone, and talk to them about not just what’s been going on at work, but what’s going on with them, personally as well. And form relationships with people. It’s important.”
5. Dramatis Personae Hazard Science You Society Politics
6. Different Forms of Communication Media Release Bulletin Press Conferences Meetings Discussions Townhall Blog Twitter, Facebook
7. Context of the communication Routine communication / updates Hazard Event Crisis Questions to ask yourself: Who is my audience? Politicians, decision-makers, general public, journalists… What level of knowledge can I expect?
8. Delicate balance of responsibilities Inform the public Be sensitive and empathic to the needs of the public Be aware of Time and critical factors Decision makers may not necessarily know / understand / have time for the details of science Hidden agendas
9. Audience: Things to consider Expectations Cognitive load / information processing With our without external stressors Basic psychological needs Autonomy Competence Relatedness Locus of control / attribution
10. Audience: Things to consider Misconceptions E.g. Earthquake “prediction”, probability, return period Expert vs. Novice mental structures
11. Example of Knowledge Organization In the HR diagram, the big, short-lived blue stars are found at the top left. Therefore, we can use main sequence fitting to determine the age of a stellar population. Image adapted from http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/teachers/lifecycles/Image31.gif
12. The Knowledge Behind This Spectral class is related to temperature Temperature from hot to cold on x-axis The lower the magnitude, the brighter Wien’s law: hotter means bluer Stefan-Boltzmann law: L ~ AT4 Mass-Luminosity relation: L ~ M3.5 Main Sequence (MS) lifetime: t ~ M/L ~ M-2.5 Therefore: the more massive the star, the shorter its MS lifetime Meaning: the more massive the star, the faster it will leave the MS Assume: that the stars are in a single population at the same distance from Earth Assume that all stars in the population are born at about the same time Conclusion: the amount and type of massive stars on the MS is indicative of a population’s age
13. Different perspectives
14. 7 C’s of Science Communication Comprehensible – simple, clear, jargon-free Contextualized – diversity, cultures, differences Captivating – engaging, relevant Credible – open, frank, acknowledges uncertainty Consistent – backed by evidence, confirmable Courteous – compassionate, empathetic, respectful (Addresses ) Concerns – empowers action/response Vivienne Bryner, doctoral research (Otago) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grhrLT8tfjg
15. Initiatives at Canterbury GEOL 113: Environmental Geohazards HAZM 403: Hazards & Disaster Investigation The Volcanic Hazards Simulation Science Communication Measures
16. GEOL 113 Alpine Fault workshop Field trip report Put students into the ‘roles’ of experts Assignment: Writing a recommendation to decision makers
17. HAZM 403 Principles of risk communication Establish trust, understand the issues, communicate message, explain decision-making process, evaluate Strong focus on written communication to different stakeholder audiences Considerations of the characteristics of different stakeholders Oral communication through press conference exercise Avoiding the potential for generation of “noise on the line” (message sent versus message received)
18. HAZM 403 Press conference: Taranaki to alert level 2 Who are the stakeholder audiences? What do they want to hear? How well can you tell them that? What are the biggest fear factors? Can you alleviate that? What arethe biggest frustrations? Can you do something about that? What are the most likely questions you’ll be facing? Do / can you know the answer? If not, how do you communicate that?
19. The Volcanic Hazard Simulation
20. What is the Volcanic Hazards Simulation? 5 hour ‘Scenario-based’ training exercise 3rd Stage Students and Experts work together to mitigate a Volcanic Disaster
21. Press Conferences Team Meetings Inter-agency Meetings Written Media Releases How do the students communicate?
22. Self-efficacy/ Confidence How can we measure communication?
23. The Instrument: PRCA-24 Level of Communication Apprehension (CA) Definition: An individual’s level of fear or anxiety associated with either real or perceived communication with another person or persons (McCroskey, 1982b; 1984) PRCA-24 (The Instrument)
24. First Cohort (n = 20) Where did the students plot? HIGH score of >80 LOW score of <51 NB. High scores indicate LOW confidence 3 10 7
25. Looking at ‘Changes’ n=20
26. Pre-interview script: Question: How do scientists actually know that a volcano is going to erupt? “ That goes back to the monitoring that we are always doing. Our scientists know when something is happening, that is different from what we usually see. That’s when we will investigate further. And ya know, break it down into what that actually means.”
27. Post-interview script: Question: How do scientists actually know that a volcano is going to erupt? “So we monitor the volcanoes constantly. And we have different methods of doing this. Scientists know what to look out for. We monitor it so frequently that, anything out of character, of the background level, so that we know something is a different kind of activity. So we will look into that further. And from there we can figure out if that is a normal process, or an increase in activity”
28. Future Work: Assessing Performance Next step: Rubrics! Using the 7 C’s, and other Best Practices Develop method of assessment via Qualitative Methods (pre-post interviews of students communications; Press conferences)  To inform RUBRIC design
29. Thank you!