Children’s Psychological Representation of Earthquakes: Analysis of Written Definitions and Rasch Scaling

Abstract

Natural disasters have a potential highly traumatic impact on psychological functioning. This is notably true for children, whose vulnerability depends on their level of cognitive and emotional development. Before formal schooling, children possess all the basic abilities to represent the phenomena of the world, including natural disasters. However, scarce attention has been paid to children’s representation of earthquakes, notwithstanding its relevance for risk awareness and for the efficacy of prevention programs. We examined children’s representation of earthquakes using different methodologies. One hundred and twenty-eight second- and fourth-graders completed a written definition task and an online recognition task, analyzed through the Rasch model. Findings from both tasks indicated that, in children’s representation, natural elements such as geological ones were the most salient, followed by man-made elements, and then by person-related elements. Older children revealed a more complex representation of earthquakes, and this was detected through the online recognition task. The results are discussed taking into account their theoretical and applied relevance. Beyond advancing knowledge of the development of the representation of earthquakes, they also inform on strengths and limitations of different methodologies. Both aspects are key resources to develop prevention programs for fostering preparedness to natural disasters and emotional prevention.

Factors Promoting Learning With a Web Application on Earthquake-Related Emotional Preparedness in Primary School

“…Within a project on earthquake-related emotional preparedness, the PrEmT project (Raccanello et al, 2019b(Raccanello et al, , 2020, we studied the role of emotions and their antecedents as factors associated to children's learning through an educational web application. The web application promotes awareness on safety procedures and earthquake-related emotions and emotion regulation strategies.…”

“…This study refers to the pilot phase of the PrEmT project (Raccanello et al, 2019b(Raccanello et al, , 2020. The data were gathered between February 2019 and May 2019 during regular school hours.…”

“…Several studies focused on psychological interventions following natural disasters with children (Kar, 2009;Pfefferbaum et al, 2019), but little is known about interventions aimed at building children's emotional resilience to combat the psychological trauma associated with future earthquakes. Therefore, within a larger project (Emotional Prevention and Earthquakes in primary school project, PrEmT project, in Italian Prevenzione Emotiva e Terremoti nella scuola primaria; Raccanello et al, 2019bRaccanello et al, , 2020Vicentini et al, 2019), we developed a web application called HEMOT R (Helmet for EMOTions, patent pending; Raccanello et al, 2020) 1 , promoting earthquake-related knowledge, emotions, and emotion regulation.…”

“…The efficacy of socio-emotional trainings for children's emotions has been demonstrated (Durlak et al, 2011), also for trainings on preparedness toward earthquakes (Raccanello et al, 2019b(Raccanello et al, , 2020. However, scarce attention has been paid at the relevance of emotional factors promoting children's learning through web applications.…”

Key Topics and Future Perspectives in Natural Hazards Research

“…Going back to the human component of exposure and impact, Raccanello et al [12] rightly recall that natural disasters have a potentially highly traumatic impact on psychological functioning of the affected population, specifically on children. This paper is extremely interesting since it investigates the psychological representation of earthquakes in children's minds, a topic that has been given scarce attention in the literature so far.…”