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Public-Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) coordinate emergency response by gathering critical information from 911 callers for dispatch to first responders. However, PSAPs fail to gather this information if 911 callers are unable, unwilling, or unavailable to report key details about an emergency. To address this problem, early-adopter PSAPs employ communication specialists to gather multimedia information from multiple sensing tools, including automated alarms, cameras, government databases, location systems, open-source websites, social media, and alternative communication channels such as text-to-911. Using preliminary usage data from an early adopter PSAP, this study identifies 11 breakdowns in 911 call taking that create opportunities for multisensor integration. This study then characterizes use cases for multisensor tools based on usage patterns observed across five incident types. These findings highlight multisensor integration as a critical area for crisis informatics research.
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How to text 911: A content analysis of text-to-911 public education information
Public education programs improve public safety by teaching citizens how to mitigate risks and respond to emergencies. To improve these efforts, studies in the fields of risk communication and emergency management have examined the design and communication of public education information. However, few studies examine the diversity of information officials communicate to the public when state and national-level public education programs are decentralized and administered by local government agencies. This study reports findings from a content analysis of text-to-911 information published on the websites of local 911 service entities across the state of Texas. Overall, these websites communicate sparse, uneven, and sometimes inconsistent information to citizens across the state regarding the availability of text-to-911 service, when and for whom texting 911 is appropriate, and instructions and warnings for texting 911 during an emergency. These findings suggest the need for public education resources that help local governments communicate with local audiences and coordinate communications across jurisdictions working to accomplish state and national public-safety objectives.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1951917
- PAR ID:
- 10281187
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- 39th ACM International Conference on Design of Communication (SIGDOC)
- 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
- Conference Paper:
- https://doi.org/10.1145/3472714.3473633
