Barbara Ryan

Information seeking in a flood

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to address the gaps in knowledge about how people get information in a flood and what they want to know.Design/methodology/approach – A total of 27 people were interviewed from two communities that suffered flooding in the 12 months before the interviews. Slow‐moving flood and flash flood were covered.Findings – The type of disaster determines how people seek information. In slow‐moving flood, people heard from others, tracked it visually and via web‐available river gauge information, and talked to others with more flood experience. Radio was an important confirmation tool in the slow‐moving flood. In flash flood, people first heard from others and then turned to television.Research limitations/implications – Participants made up a small sample skewed toward regional areas and were selected by snowball/convenience sampling methods. A survey is required to confirm or refute findings.Practical implications – Word of mouth needs to be tapped into by agencies, and mobile...