Purpose Social vulnerability in the context of disaster management refers to the sociodemographic characteristics of a population and the physical, social, economic, and environmental factors that increase their susceptibility to adverse disaster outcomes and capacity to anticipate, cope with, resist, and recover from disaster events. Because disasters do not impact people equally, researchers, public health practitioners, and emergency managers need training to meet the complex needs of vulnerable populations. Design/methodology/approach To address gaps in current education, the CONVERGE initiative, headquartered at the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado Boulder, developed the Social Vulnerability and Disasters Training Module. This free online course draws on decades of research to examine the factors that influence social vulnerability to disasters. Examples of studies and evidence-based programs are included to illuminate common methods for studying social vulnerability and ways that research can guide practice. To evaluate the module, all trainees completed a pre- and post-training questionnaire. Findings Between July 2019 and September 2021, 1,089 people completed the module. Wilcoxon signed rank tests demonstrated a significant perceived increase in self-rated knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSA). Students, members of historically underrepresented populations, and those new to or less experienced in the field, had the greatest perceived increase. Practical implications This training module can help participants understand the specific needs of socially vulnerable populations to help reduce human suffering from disasters. Originality/value This article describes a novel web-based training and offers evaluation data showing how it can help educate a broad hazards and disaster workforce on an important topic for disaster management.
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Social dimensions of fertility behavior and consumption patterns in the Anthropocene
We consider two aspects of the human enterprise that profoundly affect the global environment: population and consumption. We show that fertility and consumption behavior harbor a class of externalities that have not been much noted in the literature. Both are driven in part by attitudes and preferences that are not egoistic but socially embedded; that is, each household’s decisions are influenced by the decisions made by others. In a famous paper, Garrett Hardin [G. Hardin, Science 162, 1243–1248 (1968)] drew attention to overpopulation and concluded that the solution lay in people “abandoning the freedom to breed.” That human attitudes and practices are socially embedded suggests that it is possible for people to reduce their fertility rates and consumption demands without experiencing a loss in wellbeing. We focus on fertility in sub-Saharan Africa and consumption in the rich world and argue that bottom-up social mechanisms rather than top-down government interventions are better placed to bring about those ecologically desirable changes.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1636476
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10212869
- Author(s) / Creator(s):
- ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; more »
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Volume:
- 117
- Issue:
- 12
- ISSN:
- 0027-8424
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 6300 to 6307
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1909857117
