Social–Psychological Perspectives on Preparedness Theory and Practice: Facilitating Resilience

The growing need for people to be able to respond in timely and effective ways to the challenges posed by natural hazard events has highlighted the need for their preparation in ways that reduce their risk and increase the capacity for resilient and adaptive response and recovery when disaster strikes. This chapter first introduces the challenges to preparedness that people experience. It then discusses how social and psychological constructs and theories can be pressed into service to inform understanding how to facilitate the development of two core elements of the UNISDR definition of preparedness; encouraging people’s ability to anticipate their hazardous futures and facilitating the development of preparedness for likely events. The discussion also addresses the need for preparedness theory to have all-hazards and cross-cultural applicability. The contents draw on research examples from applying preparedness theory in New Zealand, Japan and Indonesia to discuss how universal preparedness theory can be developed. The chapter discusses the practical utility of social–psychological theory by demonstrating how theory can inform the development of a community engagement strategy and concludes by discussing the benefits of developing DRR theories and intervention practices by integrating community development, community engagement and risk management inputs.