Citation

Greenberg MR, Dyen S, Elliott S. Am. J. Public Health 2013; 103(6): e85-91.

Affiliation

Michael R. Greenberg, Susannah Dyen, and Stacey Elliott are with the Edward J. Bloustein School, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2013, American Public Health Association)

DOI

10.2105/AJPH.2012.301198

PMID

23597367

Abstract

Objectives. We surveyed how many US residents engaged in 6 preparedness activities and measured the relationship between engagement and personal experience in hazard events, flashbulb memories of major events, self-reliance, and other indicators of a conservative philosophy. Methods. We used random digit dialing for national landline (75%) and cell phone (25%) surveys of 1930 US residents from July 6, 2011, to September 9, 2011; 1080 of the sample lived near 6 US Department of Energy nuclear waste management facilities and 850 were a national random sample. Results. The median respondent engaged in 3 of the 6 activities; those who disproportionately engaged in 4 or more had experienced a hazard event, had distressing and strong flashbulb memories of major hazard events, and had strong feelings about the need for greater self-reliance. The results for the national and US Department of Energy site-specific surveys were almost identical. Conclusions. A cadre of US residents are disproportionately engaged in disaster preparedness, and they typically have stronger negative memories of past disasters and tend to be self-reliant. How their efforts can or should be integrated into local preparedness efforts is unclear. (Am J Public Health. Published online ahead of print April 18, 2013: e1-e7. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2012.301198).

Language: en