Fluent Essays

1. Listen to Invisobilia (NPR) Podcast from June 1, 2017 titled Emotions: Part 1: (55 min)https://www.npr.org/2017/06/01/530928414/emotions-...What struck you about the contents of this podcast?Some of the ideas about emotions and the way trauma impacts the brain might be controversial. How did you react to these ideas?How would you challenge those ideas or how might you be intrigued to explore more?2. Listen: to This American Life Episode 296: After The Flood (September 9, 2005), (60 min)https://www.thisamericanlife.org/296/after-the-flo...What act stuck out to you the most? Why?What would you find the most challenging as someone involved in Emergency Management or as part of a Recovery team?How might these experiences have been better prevented?What can we do to build more resilient communities BEFORE a disaster strikes so the impact of such a disaster is lessened? What must be done AFTER a disaster in this context to build community recovery and resilience?3. Listen to “The Daily” podcast episode from May 24,2018 (Links to an external site.) (23 min) https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/24/podcasts/the-da...Next, read these two articles, which can be found in the attachment.Psychological Outcomes in Reaction to Media Exposure to Disasters and Large-Scale Violence: A Meta-AnalysisSocial Media in Disaster Risk Reduction and Crisis ManagementSocial Media and the Internet undoubtedly give us helpful tools for crisis response and management. That said, there are negatives that can sometimes outweigh the positives. 1. Discuss the ways that the changing media landscape is affecting the psychosocial consequences of disaster, for better or for worse.2. Reflect on the ways that media (social or otherwise) positively and negatively impact crisis management. How can we quell the rumor mill? How do we combat further traumatization?Instructions:These posts does not have to be any particular length or style, but it does need to respond to all of the prompts.You need to give response for each separately so I can know which to what listening. socialmedia_disasterriskreduction_1_.pdf psych_mediaexposure_2017_1_.pdf Unformatted Attachment Preview Sci Eng Ethics (2014) 20:717–733 DOI 10.1007/s11948-013-9502-z ORIGINAL PAPER Social Media in Disaster Risk Reduction and Crisis Management David E. Alexander Received: 24 April 2013 / Accepted: 27 November 2013 / Published online: 4 December 2013  Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013 Abstract This paper reviews the actual and potential use of social media in emergency, disaster and crisis situations. This is a field that has generated intense interest. It is characterised by a burgeoning but small and very recent literature. In the emergencies field, social media (blogs, messaging, sites such as Facebook, wikis and so on) are used in seven different ways: listening to public debate, monitoring situations, extending emergency response and management, crowd-sourcing and collaborative development, creating social cohesion, furthering causes (including charitable donation) and enhancing research. Appreciation of the positive side of social media is balanced by their potential for negative developments, such as disseminating rumours, undermining authority and promoting terrorist acts. This leads to an examination of the ethics of social media usage in crisis situations. Despite some clearly identifiable risks, for example regarding the violation of privacy, it appears that public consensus on ethics will tend to override unscrupulous attempts to subvert the media. Moreover, social media are a robust means of exposing corruption and malpractice. In synthesis, the widespread adoption and use of social media by members of the public throughout the world heralds a new age in which it is imperative that emergency managers adapt their working practices to the challenge and potential of this development. At the same time, they must heed the ethical warnings and ensure that social media are not abused or misused when crises and emergencies occur. Keywords Social media
Disasters
Emergency management
Ethics
Twitter
Facebook D. E. Alexander (&) Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK e-mail: david.alexander@ucl.ac.uk 123 718 D. E. Alexander Introduction and Definitions At 09:02, local time, on 29th May 2012, a damaging earthquake struck EmiliaRomagna and Lombardy regions of northern Italy. This was the second major seismic event to affect the area in 10 days. It killed 17 people and caused extensive damage to 40 municipalities. Within 50 minutes a clear and relatively comprehensive picture of the earthquake and some of its most important impacts was available. It could be consulted via the Internet from almost anywhere in the world. The information presented was essentially accurate and the speed with which it became available was largely a result of the use of social media to communicate from the sites affected to places where data could be collected and presented to the public. The term ‘social media’ embraces blogs, micro-blogs, social book-marking, social networking, forums, collaborative creation of documents (via wikis1) and the sharing of audio, photographic and video files (Balana 2012). It is characterised by interactive communication, in which message content is exchanged between individuals, audiences, organisations and sectors of the general public. Social media usage is, to some extent, negatively correlated with age and positively with educational attainment. For example, people over the age of 55 tend to prefer conventional sources of news. The degree of adoption of social media varies from country to country but is generally dynamic in most environments and hence any summary statistics are liable to become outdated rapidly. Attempts to relate social media to personality factors have suggested that they are most attractive to people, of both sexes, who are relatively extrovert (Correa et al. 2010), but there is no indication of the extent to which any effort to develop profiles of users might be culturally conditioned. Information on gender differentiation is, at best, fragmentary (Armstrong and McAdams 2009). In the United States, the Internet is the most important source of information for people under the age of 30. For other Americans, it is second only to television (Krimsky 2007). Elsewhere, the use of ‘smart’ phones and social media resources is increasing so rapidly that they are now a force to be reckoned with throughout the world. Social media dispense with ‘‘information gatekeepers’’, which include doctors giving on-line medical advice and journalists relating a news story. These figures are replaced by apomediaries, in which network filtering or group moderation are the only processes by which the spontaneous feed of information is regulated—a matter of apomediation or disintermediation (Eysenbach 2008). This paper offers a review of the use of social media in disasters and major incidents. I consider both how citizens, emergency managers and first responders make use of social media in crisis and how researchers perceive and characterise the phenomenon. I examine seven ways in which social media are put to use for disaster response, recovery and risk reduction. As social media have both beneficial and potentially malign connotations, their advantages and drawbacks are discussed. Next, I consider the ethical implications of social media in disaster, including the 1 The term ‘wiki’ is defined by the OED as ‘‘A type of web page designed so that its content can be edited by anyone who accesses it, using a simplified markup language.’’ It was apparently first used in 1995. 123 Social Media in Disaster Risk Reduction 719 risks and dilemmas of unregulated communication and the degree of inclusiveness of new media. In order to end on a positive note, examples of successes with social media in disaster are briefly discussed. Finally, some conclusions are drawn, but these must necessarily be provisional, as the field is in the early stages of rapid evolution in relation to both technological development and social acceptance. The Research Literature The research literature on social networking and social media in disasters and crises is still quite limited. Moreover, it focuses on the short-term aspects of emergency response and rapid recovery. It is understandable that there are as yet no studies of the longer term, both because social media are a relatively new phenomenon and because the research is also new. Although ‘new media’, such as the Internet, have received attention from academics for a decade or more, very little of the research on social networking predates 2007. However, there is a trend towards a rapid increase in the number of papers that have been published. In this context, the literature on ‘social media’ needs to be differentiated from that on the social aspects of mass media, which is a much wider field that embraces more conventional and long-standing forms of dissemination of information, such as radio and television (Quarantelli 1989). Studies of social media in disasters have been conducted as part of a general tendency to examine the functioning of social interaction by means of the Internet and mobile devices (Krimsky 2007). Both sets of literature concentrate mainly on specific themes, which are: • • • • how social networks function and how they are used how to build and utilise algorithms either to enhance social networking or to monitor it the extent to which people use social networks, how they perceive them and what their communication preferences are the penetration of devices such as ‘smart’ mobile telephones and the extent to which these provide people with access to social media. In addition, students of risk, crisis and disaster have studied: • • • how social media are used in crises the views and opinions of emergency managers and journalists regarding social media and the extent to which the new media are integrated with more traditional means of communication how social media interact with the traditional sources of information. There is a broad distinction between studies of the technical and social aspects of new media. The creation of new platforms and algorithms characterises the former (Cheong and Lee 2010; White and Plotnik 2010), while studies of the kinds of usage and messages sent relate to the latter (Hughes and Palen 2009; Lindsay 2011). The technical side includes by studies of the rate and modality of diffusion of messages (Song and Yan 2012). 123 720 D. E. Alexander While researchers work to develop software for the efficient dissemination of messages via social networks during crisis situations (e.g. Plotnick et al. 2009), Reuter et al. (2012) advocated a more systematic approach to the use of social networking software in crisis situations, starting with classification of uses and potentials. Researchers are equivocal about the balance between the advantages and drawbacks of social media (see below), but they are united in identifying the uses to which the media can be put. Social media promote cross-platform accessibility and a constant flow of information. Situational updates can be complemented by geographical and locational data (Vieweg et al. 2010). Just-in-time information can be provided on how to cope with developing situations. Moreover, social media provide a framework for the work of journalists and for public discussion and debate. Social Media in Disaster and Crisis The following are some of the ways in which social media can be used in disaster risk reduction and crisis response. 1. A listening function. Social media are able to give a voice to people who do not normally have one. They also enable a remarkably democratic form of participation in public debate and facilitate the exchange of information and points of view. During an emergency, through their tendency to coalesce opinions (or stimulate monetary donations), social media are capable of revealing some aspects of the mental and emotional state of a nation. This may seem a rather exaggerated claim, but it should be noted that Quarantelli (1997) argued that the advent of modern information and communications technology involves changes that are as profound as those that occurred after the invention of printing. These changes do, or soon will, affect directly the majority of the population and the rest indirectly. The listening function involves constantly or periodically sampling the varied output of social media. This enables currents of popular opinion and public preference to be gauged. It may also indicate how the public is behaving and reacting to events. Crawford (2009) classified online listening into three categories: background listening, reciprocal listening and delegated listening by corporations. Crawford defined background listening as mere tuning in, a minimal form of engagement. Reciprocal listening involves two-way exchange of messages, with mutual sensitivity to their content and implications; and delegated listening is a form of ‘‘arm’s length engagement’’, in which messages are monitored and responded to, if at all, en masse. Hence, listening is a question of keeping track of opinions, giving advice or collecting information that is of interest to corporations. As Crawford (2009, p. 526) noted, ‘‘there has been a glorification of ‘voice’ as the prime form of participation online.’’ 2. Monitoring a situation. Whereas the listening function involves the passive collection of information, monitoring is conducted in order to improve reactions 123 Social Media in Disaster Risk Reduction 721 to events and better to manage the general public by learning what people are thinking and doing. Current research (Bird et al. 2012) suggests that harmful and inaccurate rumours are not particularly enhanced by the use of social media. One reason for this is that, with mass participation, the false rumours that do begin to circulate are easily corrected by knowledgeable people. Hence, in the aftermath of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami of March 2011, there was little indication that the massive use of social media by the Japanese public led to the successful propagation of rumour and wildly incorrect information (Hjorth and Kim 2011). Moreover, Stirratt (2011) found that, in the Japan disaster, 49 \% of Twitter messages were either positive or somewhat positive in their attitude to emergency preparedness and only 7 \% were negative. Floods in Queensland, Australia, led to extensive use of social media for public interaction and communication, but not for the mass propagation of false information. Bird et al. (2012, pp. 30–31) noted that: ‘‘While rumours were common at the height of the disaster, respondents reported that the moderators of the Facebook pages were prompt at confirming information and providing official sources when available.’’ Hence, despite the presence of a major crisis—the floods—the use of social media did not lead to a situation of general anarchy that was out of control. 3. Integration of social media into emergency planning and crisis management. In a questionnaire survey (Barr 2011), it was found that 80 \% of US general public and 69 \% of online users felt that it would be beneficial for national emergency response organisers to monitor social networking sites regularly. However, in most places this has not happened. Agencies are afraid that social networks will produce inaccurate information of dubious provenance (Goolsby 2010). Moreover, the full integration of social networks into disaster management would require many of them to change their working practices, as, in the words of Palen et al. (2007), ‘‘command-and-control models do not easily adapt to the expanding data-generating and data-seeking activities by the public.’’ Nonetheless, there is immense potential to make data dissemination a two-way process, in which information is both received from the public and fed to it (Crowe 2012; Jennex 2012a; Sykes and Travis 2012). The assertion that command and control may be at odds with social media deserves further elaboration. I have argued elsewhere (Alexander 2008) that there is a continuum between command-based and collaborative models of emergency management. The command end of the spectrum tends to be authoritarian, and to divide competencies by level of command into strategic, tactical and operational. The collaborative end of the spectrum tends to divide competencies by theme, such as communication, logistics, and shelter. As there is no clear hierarchical structure in social media, they fit much better into a collaborative model than a command one. Present experience suggests (Yates and Paquette 2011) that issuing orders to the general public is likely to generate an adverse reaction on social media, whereas issuing requests for collaboration may elicit a more positive response, based on involvement rather than alienation. Moreover, the thematic organisation of 123 722 D. E. Alexander collaborative models of emergency management favour collective information sharing on tasks, topics and sectors. Hughes and Palen (2012) observed that the strict bureaucratic nature of emergency management systems, such as the US NIMS, is at variance with the open system and free access character of the social media of which emergency managers are being exhorted to make use. However, the direct, person to person nature of social media is a boon to public information officers, as it helps them avoid the common pitfall of being misquoted by the official media. Moreover, citizens are widely recognised to be the real first responders after disaster (Helsloot and Ruitenberg 2004): they hold the key to the use of social media as an extension of emergency management. Rarely are emergency management organisations ready to utilise such developments. As Westbrook et al. (2012, p. 2) observed, ‘‘The community, volunteer organizations, and news organizations are currently embracing social media, but EM is slow to adopt and implement it on a full scale.’’ There are demonstrable benefits from doing so. For example, Vihalemm et al. (2012) found that social media can help citizens receive, understand and cope emotionally with warning messages. Yet there is an imperative to act: the public can now share information and disseminate critical news to the world and each other without going through government communication methods. This is revolutionizing the way in which people seek help and the way first responders and managers receive and exchange information. The very structure of communication and information sharing dynamics is changing for both for emergency managers and the public. As the Director of the US. Federal Emergency Management Agency, Craig Fugate, stated in a Senate Homeland Security Hearing in 2011, one of the social elements that is changing in the field of emergency management is the way the public can now be viewed ‘‘as a resource and not a liability.’’ For example, social media can be used to deliver warnings to users. In the most sophisticated cases, these may involve local information in the form of maps and data, as well as instructions on what to do during an impending crisis. 4. Crowd-sourcing and collaborative development. In most disasters, the first responders are the public. Moreover, social capital is involved in the form of the mobilisation of skills, leadership, networks, support systems, and so on (Dufty 2012). This involves the concept that social networks and interaction between people increase productivity and lend added value to outcomes. The social networks benefit from the particular skills of their members. One aspect of the formation of social capital through social media is crowd-sourcing. For example, Ushahidi is the name of a crowd-sourced crisis mapping platform (www.ushahidi.com—Gao et al. 2011a). Sahana, and its derivatives Eden, Vesuvius and Mayon, are open source disaster management systems. These initiatives rely on spontaneous contributions to make them work. This endows them with positive feedback, in that the more they are used, the more popular they become and the more they encourage users to contribute to them. Ushahidi and Sahana are examples of the use of social media to create and disseminate methods and good practices, and to form social capital. They are open-source, 123 Social Media in Disaster Risk Reduction 723 free-access platforms that can be used and modified by anyone. In this respect, they are particularly useful for places where disaster management and response are poorly developed and resources are scarce. In crowd-sourcing, it is suggested that 1 \% of the crowd will create content, 10 \% will validate it and 89 \% will use it (Goolsby 2010). However, this is sufficient to maintain a constant flux of information and a high level of consultation of the sites built upon crowd-sourcing. The drawbacks are that crowd-sourcing lacks a common mechanism to facilitate coordination between organisations, it lacks security features, and it does not necessarily provide the information that is most needed or most accurate (Hammon and Hippner 2012). Nevertheless, crisis mapping is particularly suited to crowd-sourcing through the use of social networks, in that reports can be received from many users, and compiled into the resultant maps, which can be widely disseminated. Maps can depict survivors’ temporary settlement camps, resource distribution sources, accessible roads, impacted areas, and so on. In the words of one researcher (Goolsby 2009), crowd-sourcing creates a sort of ‘‘open intranet’’ in relation to the Internet, or in other words a community of users. 5. Creating social cohesion and promoting therapeutic initiatives. Social media can be used to make people feel part of particular initiatives. They can foster a sense of identification with local or on-line com ... Purchase answer to see full attachment