Communicating with Coastal Decision-Makers and Environmental Educators via Sea Level Rise Decision-Support Tools

Abstract

Communicating about environmental risks requires understanding and addressing stakeholder needs, perspectives, and anticipated uses for communication products and decision-support tools. This paper demonstrates how long-term dialogue between scientists and stakeholders can be facilitated by repeated stakeholder focus groups. We describe a dialogic process for developing science-based decision-support tools as part of a larger sea level rise research project in the Gulf of Mexico. We demonstrate how focus groups can be used effectively in tool development, discuss how stakeholders plan to use tools for decision-making and broader public outreach, and describe features that stakeholders perceive would make products more usable.

Coastal decision‐makers’ perspectives on updating storm surge guidance tools

“…For example, some participants use it for decision support before or during storm events, while others employ it to assist with day‐to‐day operations rather than storm response decisions. This finding is in line with prior research that shows users may have tool uses designers may not have anticipated (eg DeLorme et al, 2018). Moreover, users may seek different types of information during different stages of a hazard event to support strategic decision‐making (Kolen & Helsloot, 2014).…”

“…The involvement of decision‐makers in tool development also allows assessments to be made in a timelier fashion due to their familiarization with the tool (Kolen & Helsloot, 2012). Moreover, careful consideration of users’ needs is central to ethical tool design (Richards, 2015), and feedback from end users during development can alert developers to unanticipated applications of tools (DeLorme, Stephens, Hagen, & Bilskie, 2018).…”

“…Roth, Hart, Mead, and Quinn (2017) used wireframing (gathering user feedback on prototypes of increasing fidelity) to aid in developing a visualization of water levels in the U.S. Great Lakes. Qualitative social science methods that engage end users in dialogue can be especially beneficial in helping developers understand users’ expectations, concerns, needs, and applications for certain tools (DeLorme et al, 2018).…”

Community involvement in coastal infrastructure adaptation should balance necessary complexity and perceived effort

“…For projects where fewer resources are available for community engagement, there is a need to develop channels of feedback that balance efficiency with accuracy. While interviews and focus groups have been shown to be effective, surveys can be utilized in tandem to collect a wider range of perspectives (DeLorme et al, 2018). Surveys that are designed to elicit probabilistic responses from participants-essentially asking them to think like experts-have been shown to be an ineffective method of communication (Fischhoff, 1995;Salman and Li, 2018).…”

Environmental Communication Planning in the Development of Mangrove Ecotourism in Bengkalis Indonesia

“…This stage consists of steps of situation analysis and problem identification, analysis of public/actors involved, and setting of communication objectives. Research on problem of damage to mangrove and the usability of communication methods is audience dependent, and often requires long-term interaction with target audiences in order to understand their particular needs [17]. Determining the purpose of communication is to utilize and focus the power of the communication system produced to make communication more effective and efficient [12].…”