John H. Sims

Educational Programs and Human Response to Natural Hazards

That an individual is aware of the risk of a natural hazard and the range of damage mitigation measures is no guarantee that he or she will act on this information. Based on a review of the literature, the available evidence is weak on the relatonship between awareness or knowledge and the consequent adoption of damage mitigation measures. Although substantial sums of money are expended each year on public information programs on natural hazards, little effort has focused on the cost-effectiveness of such programs.

FLOOD INSURANCE: SOME DETERMINANTS OF ADOPTION

The literature on response to natural hazards is surveyed to identify factors possibly at work in determining what coping behaviors are adopted. These factors are then explored in the context of a specific study of the purchase or nonpurchase of flood insurance in the floodplain communities of Seguin and New Braunfels, Texas. Three factors are found to be significantly related to insurance adoption: previous experience of flood damage, social class, and a single dimension of personality-internal-external locus of control.

The Adoption of Residential Flood Mitigation Measures: What Price Success?

A review of public efforts to persuade persons-at-risk to take protective measures against natural hazards reveals a variety of programmatic strategies to which their success or failure presumably ...

PROFESSIONAL BIAS AND WATER REUSE

A projective test is used to explore the attitudes, feelings, and expectations of state health officials and consulting engineers toward the possible public use of renovated wastewater. The responses of both groups not only reflect their professional expertise but reveal their professional biases as

Religious apostasy and political radicalism.

The affirmation of radical left political ideology was examined among a total of 159 religious apostates and 272 religious believers who were undergraduates at five Chicago area colleges (study I) and seven western North Carolina colleges (study II). Contrary to current assumptions, apostates were not converts to radical ideology in any significant proportion, although they were clearly more disenchanted with their society and more sharply critical of its basic institutions. Apostates seem to take an ideological stance of critical disengagement rather than substitute conversion. Implications are discussed in the context of Eriksons theory interrelating ideological commitment and identity formation in youth.

Birthorder among Psychotherapists: A See-Saw Phenomenon

Firstborns were over-represented among a sample of 3,992 psychotherapists from New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, extending this familiar birthorder effect to yet another highly educated population. However, birthorder distributions varied surprisingly and systematically by family size. Among the minority of Ss from families of 5 or more children, lastborns were over-represented and firstborns were not. Implications of this finding for one-factor explanations of birthorder effects are discussed.