Social Media and Emergency Services?

Reuter, Christian; Ludwig, Thomas; Friberg, Therese; Pratzler-Wanczura, Sylvia; Gizikis, Alexis

doi:10.4018/ijiscram.2015040103

Cited by 20 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…This is proven by the high percentage of status messages used for talking about natural hazards. The predominant use of push tactics by emergency management agencies is consistent with other studies, and it can be considered a safe way of disseminating official information on SM [62,70].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 71%

Keep Them Engaged: Romanian County Inspectorates for Emergency Situations’ Facebook Usage for Disaster Risk Communication and Beyond

2018

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Nowadays, the use of social media by public institutions involved in disaster management is starting to become common practice. However, despite scientific interest in the effect of social media on disaster risk and crisis communication, data exploring emergency management agencies' round-the-clock Facebook usage and the impact of their content and media choices on stakeholder engagement is limited. This study set out to investigate Romanian local emergency agencies' Facebook usage patterns and stakeholders' engagement with their content. The data is comprised of 7810 messages posted between the 1st January and 25th October 2017 by 32 County Inspectorates for Emergency Situations. First, using content analysis techniques, the topics of the posts were summarized to illustrate how these agencies use Facebook. Second, stakeholder engagement was investigated using social media marketing techniques. Third, messages related to natural hazards were analyzed in greater depth to reveal disaster risk communication patterns. The results suggest that Romanian emergency agencies mainly promote transparency and their institutional image on Facebook. Stakeholders were most likely to engage with brand-oriented posts, especially if these also offered rich multimedia feature. Meanwhile, stakeholders were less likely to interact with messages about natural hazards, particularly if they incorporated educational content. These observations suggest that, while at the moment Romanian local emergency management agencies take advantage of Facebook to create and maintain relationships with their stakeholders, they bypass opportunities to implement communication strategies for effective disaster risk reduction.Emergency management agencies are encouraged to leverage SM in order to engage with their stakeholders, especially considering the citizens' growing demand for their permanent SM presence [9,10]. Recently, numerous recommendations have emerged from research and practice to guide emergency managers through the process of implementing and maintaining SM pages. These recommendations cover a wide range of topics, such as the identification of the most suitable SM tools/applications to fulfil specific communication objectives [7,11]; the development of policy documents [12] or best practices in order to establish an active presence on SM; and the establishing of a network of stakeholders [13,14].There is a wide range of different SM applications, such as blogs, social networking sites, media-sharing services, web map services and wikis, that can be used for risk and crisis communication in unique ways [15]. In each of these SM applications, stakeholder engagement can be measured in different ways, giving valuable insight on their interactions. These measures can serve as metrics for evaluating SM effectiveness in risk and crisis communication [16]. However, only a handful of studies examine how factors such as content or media type influence stakeholder engagement in the field of disaster management. For example, Sutton et al. [17] examin...

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 71%

Keep Them Engaged: Romanian County Inspectorates for Emergency Situations’ Facebook Usage for Disaster Risk Communication and Beyond

2018

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“…3). Using existing social media ecosystems, like Facebook groups, with applications embedded for disaster response is argued to facilitate the smooth adoption of online tools for disasters (Reuter et al, 2015). With DSFGs, many survivors do not need to change their technology use or navigate confusing online systems.…”

Section: Disaster Response During and After The Camp Firementioning

confidence: 99%

The tensions of crowdsourcing disaster response in disaster‐specific Facebook groups after the Camp Fire

Benedict

2024

Risk Hazard & Crisis Pub Pol

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Disaster‐specific Facebook groups (DSFGs) are Facebook groups devoted to a specific disaster or set of disasters. I argue DSFGs offer opportunities for disaster response and resilience organizing that can mitigate the limitations of institutionalized disaster response and illustrate the benefits and detriments of the use of DSFGs by survivors after California's 2018 Camp Fire. This study explores the helpfulness and unhelpfulness or hurtfulness of Camp Fire Facebook groups (CFFGs) for survivors' recoveries. I surveyed 232 Camp Fire survivors who used CFFGs. Sharing recovery processes and spreading information in CFFGs were both helpful and unhelpful to survivors' recoveries. CFFGs were also helpful for exchanging direct assistance, sustaining community, developing new relationships, lifting spirits, and championing survivors and unhelpful or hurtful due to scamming, facing negativity, and encountering the victim mentality. I contend that tensions exist for crowdsourcing disaster response in DSFGs, whereby what makes a DSFG helpful can also be unhelpful or hurtful, and I call for coordination between DSFGs and institutional disaster response to improve disaster response networks.

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“…Externalactorsareregularlyincludedinthebriefings.Theseupdatesarecarriedoutviamediating artefactsthatmayvarydependingoncircumstances.Ateleconferenceisfrequentlyused,butalso toolslikeSkype.Insuchcaseswheretelephonesand/ortheinternetconnectionisnotanoptionfor anyreason,theTetra-basedcommunicationsystemRAKELcanbeusedforbriefings. Informationisgatheredindifferentways,e.g.throughphonecalls,byfollowingthenewsor socialmedia.Socialmediaisaquickwaytogatherandshareinformationwiththepublic (Mirbabaie & Youn, 2018;Reuter et al, 2015). Some channels, such as social media, email, collaboration conferencesandWIScanbeusedbothtogatherinformationforthecrisismanagementteambutalso todeliverinformation.Intheperspectiveofmateriality,theseartefactscanbeseenasmultifunctional astheyserveasbothsensegiversandsensemakers.Weicketal.…”

Section: Emil: Is There a Map? I Need To Have A Look At It To Know Wh...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Materiality Matters When Organizing for Crisis Management

Granholm

2018

International Journal of Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management

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Sensemaking is the process to make sense of an unknown event. Research on the contribution of materiality in sensemaking is currently an area in need of further study. The Swedish system of crisis management puts the municipality in a key position when managing a crisis. Making the municipal situation room an interesting area for research. This study focuses on sensemaking in the municipal situation room during crisis management. The area of interest is when and why digital and/or non-digital resources are being used during sensemaking. The study contributes to an understanding of how sensemaking are performed in entanglement with the materiality provided. This is important for understanding needs of exercises and needs of resources in the situation room. The study was conducted as a qualitative study where interviews and observations were used to gather empirical evidence.

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Social Media and Emergency Services?

Cited by 20 publications

References 22 publications

Keep Them Engaged: Romanian County Inspectorates for Emergency Situations’ Facebook Usage for Disaster Risk Communication and Beyond

Keep Them Engaged: Romanian County Inspectorates for Emergency Situations’ Facebook Usage for Disaster Risk Communication and Beyond

The tensions of crowdsourcing disaster response in disaster‐specific Facebook groups after the Camp Fire

Materiality Matters When Organizing for Crisis Management

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