Misconceptions About Disasters by Auf der Heide (2004) - Article

Introduction

Disaster planning can only be good if the assumptions on which it is based are good. However, it appears that disaster planning is often based on inaccurate beliefs. This can result in dysfunctional responses. This article tries to identify some misconceptions about disasters and the ineffective responses that arise from them. Most field disaster research has been conducted in the United States, and so the writers will focus their discussion mostly on the lessons learned from them. There is evidence that implies that the findings can be used worldwide, but we should still be careful generalizing the data, because other countries have different cultures, economies and politics.

Community resilience

People often think that disasters go together with personal chaos. They think that people start panicking, are not concerned for others and act irrationally. They also think that people become aggressive towards others. Also, they think that the victims develop a so-called disaster syndrome, which is a childlike condition and the victim needs to be taken cared for by an organization. All the ideas mentioned above are believed by the public, emergency workers (police, firefighters and military), by the media and the government. Even when interviewees have said that they haven’t seen these things happen during a disaster, people view this as atypical. They then believe that this was caused by a unique spirit of the group. Researchers have found that all the ideas mentioned above are not true and that the community shows resilience, unity, altruism and prosocial behaviour directly after a disaster. However, this doesn’t mean that antisocial behaviour doesn’t occur in disasters, it just means that they are uncommon in typical situations of a disaster.

Misconception of panic

The word panic is often not understood correctly and therefore often used loosely to describe any type of fear or chaotic activity. Many people who survive a disaster describe their behaviour and that of others as panic. However, this is often wrong, because they are observing rational behaviour based on fear. In a crisis, it’s normal to experience fear and to flee from a disaster. In fact, this is often a rational course of action. Panic is irrational and hysterical, without regard for others. Most people evacuating help each other to get out.

The conditions that must be present simultaneously to trigger panic are: rapidly closing escape routes, perception of an immediate threat of entrapment in a space, no one can help and flight seems to be the only way to survive. The combination of these four things is not common in disasters, and so panic is quite rare. According to research, when panic does occur, it is short-lived, not contagious and only involves a few people. Research with firefighters and survivors of fires showed that people didn’t really started panicking when a big fire started in their complex, but they did show protective behaviours, like helping each other, warning each other and calling the fire department. Some scientists have wondered if the lack of panic would apply to a bioterrorism incident. One study looked at the 1995 sarin gas attack in Tokyo. Some of the interviewed victims used the term panic to describe the events. However, their observations of the way everyone behaved were not consistent with the definition of panic. There was much helping behaviour. In other accounts of incidents with diseases (influenza battle), people also helped each other out in different ways.

What’s a more common problem than panic is evacuating people and keeping them from returning from a dangerous place before the danger is over. An example of this is that a lot of people don’t want to evacuate when a hurricane is coming. It’s often the case that people respond to warnings of threatening disasters with disbelief. When the warning appears to be credible, they try to confirm its validity. They do this by listening to the television or talking to relatives and neighbours. If the reports of the threat are vague, than people tend to downplay the danger of it. Sirens are also non-specific warning messages, so they tend to be ineffective in getting people to undertake protective action. However, people are more likely to evacuate when the threat is of a technological emergency and unfamiliar or invisible to the public. One problem about the misconception of panic, is that emergency workers and public officials believe it. That’s why they might hesitate to give warnings, because they think that people will start panicking and this will result in a lot of damage. Recommendations have been given to avoid panic in cases of fire by acting as if nothing is happening, until the very last moment and to give as little information as possible to the inhabitants on a building. The officials should actually be concerned with improving the warnings (e.g. so the people act according to the warning). People are more likely to act on warning messages if they believe the warning to be true, if they understand it and if they believe that they are at risk. Messages are also more credible if they are given by a credible source, like the police or other officials. Warnings need to be specific. People need to know more than just knowing that there is a threat. The context in which a warning is given is also important. Other factors that can enhance compliance with warnings, are repeated warnings and same warnings from different sources and assuring people that there will be no looting.

Misconception of the disaster syndrome

There is another misconception about disaster. People think that individuals who are really overwhelmed with a disaster, develop a so-called disaster syndrome or disaster shock. This results in the incapability of taking care of oneself or others. People think that these individuals are really dependent and susceptible to authority figures. However, it’s only a small number of victims that suffers from the psychological shock and this is often limited to victims of violent disasters. However, this condition is often short lived.

Most disaster victims help themselves and others. There are many examples throughout history that show that most feeding, sheltering, transporting and rescuing has been carried out by survivors in the stricken area. Search parties often also consists of non-trained individuals, like relatives, friends, colleagues and strangers that were near the scene and time of the impact. However, search and rescue by survivors is often not well-coordinated. These rescue teams might be helped if they could get some provisions by the local officials. These officials should include the provisions in their plans.

The non-trained rescue parties think that the best thing they could do for the victims, is to bring them to the hospital, instead of waiting for the ambulances to come. Many victims who have been brought to the hospital by non-ambulance people, have not received first-aid treatment. Much of the initial care of disaster victims is provided by survivors and it might be a good idea to provide the public with first-aid and disaster skills. Leaflets with educational things about disaster could also be handed out to the public.

Most casualty transport is carried out by survivors and therefore, most victims end up at the closest hospital to the impact site, while other hospitals nearby don’t receive many victims. The hospitals closest to the impact site overload. This happens despite having made plans over the equitable distribution of patients. However, these plans were of course based on the assumption that most patients would be transported by ambulances. Communities are caught off guard when people take matters in their own hands. There are some things that can be done to reduce the overloading of hospitals. If it’s possible, transporting people from the public should be advised which hospitals are receiving fewer patients and thus have shorter waiting times. The use of telephones for this communication is not always working, because telephone circuits become overloaded. It’s better to use two-way radio networks. It can also be possible to stop vehicles that are transporting patients on major routes to certain hospitals, and to redirect to them other hospitals.

People from the public will also try to reunite with their loved ones. If it’s not possible to reunite, they will take actions to find out if loved ones are okay. This can have effects on emergency response organizations. Most people in the US are mobile, and almost everyone has a relative that lives in another part of the nation. Also, because of social media, relatively small events can become well known in the whole world in minutes time. However, the specifics of these events are not well known on social media and people just need to call and ask their loved ones to see whether they are okay. When warnings have been issued, people will call and ask how they could help (e.g. donations). Because of this phone traffic, it’s not weird to imagine that the phone circuits become overloaded.

Disaster planners often think that people will panic in disasters and, because of this, they will be very dependent on authorities for help. This is the reason why disaster planners rely on the command-and-control model as a basis of responses. According to this model, strong leadership can overcome the hardships that are caused by dysfunctional suffering caused by the disaster. Also, this model thinks that most counter-disaster activities have to be carried out by authorities. Authorities will develop plans for how to respond to disasters, but they are unware that the public takes actions on their own. Disaster researchers therefore give the recommendation to make plans that are based on what people naturally tend to do in disasters, rather than the model.

Authorities are caught off guard, because they don’t expect the assistance of so many volunteers. People also sometimes react to requests from the media who state that you can send something (clothing, food, supplies) to the impacted area. Local officials may also issue appeals and ask people for their help. Planners should not forget to that they have to deal with volunteers, even if they haven’t asked for their help. If volunteers are not needed, it should be made public as soon as possible.

People often donate things after a disaster. Many disaster planners are unprepared for this. the general public is not the only source that donates. Many corporations and businesses donate items. They can donate technological resources (telephones, free calls, computers, generators), tools and other supplies. However, a large part of the donations is asymmetrical to the needs of the victims involved. Examples are inappropriate clothing and medicine for diseases that are not found in the impacted area. People also want to donate blood, but when the media or leaders tell that blood is needed without first checking if that is really the case, this can cause problems in hospitals and blood banks (long waiting time). It’s important to specify one place or site to manage donations.

Looting misconception

People often have the misconception that disasters go together with an increase in looting and other antisocial behaviour. Sometimes, friends and relatives salvage the belongings of the victims. Other people who see that, might not know that these are friends or relatives of the victim and they might conclude that this person is looting. Looting and other antisocial behaviour doesn’t occur often, but when it does occur, it is often carried out by outsiders and not the members of the impacted community. However, people believe looting occurs often in disaster and because of this, they sometimes refuse to leave their properties in disasters.

The most important lesson that can be learned from this article of the writers (according to the writers themselves) is that disaster planners need to learn what people tend to do naturally in disasters and plan around this.