The effect of likelihood and impact information on public response to severe weather warnings

In this study, we explored whether providing information about the likelihood and impact severity of forecast weather affected subjective judgments of likelihood , severity, concern, trust in forecast, and intention to take protective action. In a mixed-factorial online experiment, 550 UK residents from 2 regions with different weather profiles were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 Warning Format conditions (Color-only, Text, Risk Matrix) and presented with 3 war nings: high-probability/moderate-impact (amber HPMI); low-probability/high-impact (amber); high-probability/high-impact (red). Amongst those presented with information about probability and impact severity, red high-likelihood/high-impact warnings elicited the strongest ratings on all dependent vari ables, followed by amber HPMI warnings. Amber low-likelihood/high-impact warnings elicited the lowest perceived likelihood, severity, concern, trust, and intention to take protective responses. Taken together, this indicates that UK residents are sensitive to probabilistic information for amber warn ings, and that communicating that severe events are unlikely to occur reduces perceived risk, trust in the warning, and behavioral intention, even though potential impacts could be severe. We discuss the practical implications of this for weather warning communication.
Source: Risk Analysis - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research