The public’s response to flood warnings
Research investigating how the 'at risk' flood warning is interpreted by the public and how the public responds.
Documents
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Details
This project provides a detailed understanding of the ways in which the ‘at risk’ flood warning is interpreted by the public and how the public responds to it.
The methodology is based on:
- a review of relevant literature and a secondary analysis of post-event survey data
- qualitative work with different groups in several flood risk areas
- a survey providing quantitative data on the way in which residents of at risk areas intend to act in response to the three levels of flood warning
Results
The research results show that most of the at risk population intend to act when they receive flood warnings, and most of those flooded consider their actions to have been ‘effective’. The percentage of those who act increases steadily with the severity of the warning.
The results also show that people who do not act at the earliest stage of the warning tend not to do anything at later stages. A small proportion of the at risk population say they would take no action at all, even if they received the most severe flood warning.
Recommendations
This report makes several recommendations. It should be a priority for the Environment Agency to understand the reasons why some people do not act in response to flood warnings. If the nature or dissemination of warnings is changed in any way, then it’s vital to ensure that the content of the warnings is still clear. The report also suggests future research into the ways the public responds to flood warnings.
This project ran from 2003 to 2006.