We are thrilled to announce that our paper titled „Understanding Crisis Preparedness: Insights from Personal Values, Beliefs, Social Norms, and Personal Norms“ has been awarded the Best Research Paper Award at the ISCRAM 2024 conference.
Jasmin Haunschild, Felix Burger, Christian Reuter (2024): Understanding Crisis Preparedness: Insights from Personal Values, Beliefs, Social Norms, and Personal Norms. Proceedings of the Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management (ISCRAM) ;21. [Download PDF]
Our study delves into the critical importance of household-level crisis preparedness for societal resilience in the face of disasters and crises. Motivating citizens to take personal responsibility for preparedness measures remains a formidable challenge. By conducting a survey in Germany focusing on resource-oriented crisis preparedness and participants’ values, we were able to distinguish between more prepared and less prepared individuals. Our quantitative analysis revealed a significant correlation between the value of benevolence and higher levels of preparedness.
Furthermore, follow-up interviews with 30 participants explored their beliefs and norms, uncovering minimal differences between the groups. While crisis preparedness is generally viewed positively, there is strong negativity towards those perceived as “hoarders.” Our study discusses the implications for crisis communication and the design of nudges and persuasive systems, emphasizing interventions that can trigger benevolence and appeal to the social benefits of preparedness, countering the negative perception of anti-social behavior in crisis situations.
The ISCRAM 2024 conference is held in Münster, Germany, from May 25th to 29th, 2024. This event follows a pracademic approach has been jointly hosted by the ERCIS Competence Center for Crisis Management (C³M) at the University of Münster and the State Fire Service Institute North Rhine-Westphalia (IdF). The conference theme, “Embracing the Crisis Management Lifecycle,” emphasized a holistic and integrated process view of crisis management, highlighting the importance of well-structured and clearly defined roles, tasks, and processes to support communication and collaboration among involved actors.
We are honored to receive this award and look forward to contributing further to the field of crisis management.
This collaborative research of TU Darmstadt (research groups FAI and PEASEC) has been funded within emergenCITY and ATHENE.
