Methods matter. They influence what we know and who we come to know about in the context of hazards and disasters. Research methods are of profound importance to the scholarly advancement of the field and, accordingly, a growing number of publications focus on research methods and ethical practices associated with the study of extreme events. Still, notable gaps exist. The National Science Foundation-funded Social Science Extreme Events Research (SSEER) network was formed, in part, to respond to the need for more specific information about the status and expertise of the social science hazards and disaster research workforce. Drawing on data from 1,013 SSEER members located across five United Nations (UN) regions, this article reports on the demographic characteristics of SSEER researchers; provides a novel inventory of methods used by social science hazards and disaster researchers; and explores how methodological approaches vary by specific researcher attributes including discipline, professional status, researcher type based on level of involvement in the field, hazard/disaster type studied, and disaster phase studied. The results have implications for training, mentoring, and workforce development initiatives geared toward ensuring that a diverse next generation of social science researchers is prepared to study the root causes and social consequences of disasters.
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“How Do We Actually Do Convergence” for Disaster Resilience? Cases from Australia and the United States
Abstract In recent years there has been an increasing emphasis on achieving convergence in disaster research, policy, and programs to reduce disaster losses and enhance social well-being. However, there remain considerable gaps in understanding “how do we actually do convergence?” In this article, we present three case studies from across geographies—New South Wales in Australia, and North Carolina and Oregon in the United States; and sectors of work—community, environmental, and urban resilience, to critically examine what convergence entails and how it can enable diverse disciplines, people, and institutions to reduce vulnerability to systemic risks in the twenty-first century. We identify key successes, challenges, and barriers to convergence. We build on current discussions around the need for convergence research to be problem-focused and solutions-based, by also considering the need to approach convergence as ethic, method, and outcome. We reflect on how convergence can be approached as an ethic that motivates a higher order alignment on “why” we come together; as a method that foregrounds “how” we come together in inclusive ways; and as an outcome that highlights “what” must be done to successfully translate research findings into the policy and public domains.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1847373
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10314964
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- International Journal of Disaster Risk Science
- Volume:
- 12
- Issue:
- 3
- ISSN:
- 2095-0055
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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The function of long-term memory is not just to reminisce about the past, but also to make predictions that help us behave appropriately and efficiently in the future. This predictive function of memory provides a new perspective on the classic question from memory research of why we remember some things but not others. If prediction is a key outcome of memory, then the extent to which an item generates a prediction signifies that this information already exists in memory and need not be encoded. We tested this principle using human intracranial EEG as a time-resolved method to quantify prediction in visual cortex during a statistical learning task and link the strength of these predictions to subsequent episodic memory behavior. Epilepsy patients of both sexes viewed rapid streams of scenes, some of which contained regularities that allowed the category of the next scene to be predicted. We verified that statistical learning occurred using neural frequency tagging and measured category prediction with multivariate pattern analysis. Although neural prediction was robust overall, this was driven entirely by predictive items that were subsequently forgotten. Such interference provides a mechanism by which prediction can regulate memory formation to prioritize encoding of information that could help learn new predictive relationships.
SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT When faced with a new experience, we are rarely at a loss for what to do. Rather, because many aspects of the world are stable over time, we rely on past experiences to generate expectations that guide behavior. Here we show that these expectations during a new experience come at the expense of memory for that experience. From intracranial recordings of visual cortex, we decoded what humans expected to see next in a series of photographs based on patterns of neural activity. Photographs that generated strong neural expectations were more likely to be forgotten in a later behavioral memory test. Prioritizing the storage of experiences that currently lead to weak expectations could help improve these expectations in future encounters. -
Addressing the 2023 theme of Global Responsibilities of Engineers, in particular the disproportionate impacts of climate change on communities in remote regions of Alaska, this paper tracks the “social life” of a prefabricated frame assembly system designed for constructing homes in emergency contexts in northern Alaska (Appadurai 1986). An Alaskan housing research center began using this prefabricated system over a decade ago, in a time of crisis caused by major spring flooding in an Alaskan riverine community that has long grappled with housing shortages. The destruction of these homes, along with the possessions of the people living in them, was a tremendous loss to this community. The region’s short building season and dependency on barge and aerial transportation services for shipping in building supplies further compounded these challenges. In response, local and federal agencies came together and decided on a housing design that uses an integrated wall and truss system that could be prefabricated off-site, shipped out, rapidly assembled by volunteer building crews in the affected site, and that facilitated a highly insulated energy efficient home. As a result, this design played a critical role in mediating further disaster. Fast-forward to the present, the housing research center continues to opt for this system for most remote designs, but builders and engineers have begun to debate whether its advantages outweigh some of its logistical challenges. Some argue that its value has been overstated, while others describe it as a practical and affordable method for building energy efficient homes in remote Alaskan communities. Still others have adapted its design to fit their needs, thus producing new variations of the design, while also showing how the design of this building system might be reimagined. A deep dive into this debate provides an opportunity to analyze how both knowledge building and moral stances inform the ways that engineers assume global responsibilities related to communities affected by climate change. Drawing on three years of ethnographic research among Alaskan engineers, builders, housing advocates, and community stakeholders, this case study reflects what design scholars describe) as the “moralization of technology” through engineering practices (Verbeek 2006: 269). From this perspective, engineering systems may take on multiple meanings and applications, including marking differences in thought, creativity, and moral affinity among experts who are working to addressing affordable housing needs in Alaska. Reflecting on these differences in perspective, this paper tracks the “cultural biography” of this engineered system across time, place, and institutional, cultural, and geographic settings to probe how debates about the efficacy of this prefabricated system come to index varying moral stances and value systems that are deeply qualitative but also very much a part of the technical and materializing processes of the building design (Kopytoff 1986). As a case study, this analysis also can serve as a teaching tool in engineering and interdisciplinary classrooms for examining the integrative nature of ethics and technology as related to a range of human impacts on the environment and marginalized communities.more » « less
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1007/s13753-021-00340-y
