The impact of language and cognition on compliance during a natural disaster
Improving communication with people affected by flooding

SPONSORS:

The Leverhulme Trust

PARTNERS/COLLABORATORS:

King's College London
University of East Anglia
Drinking Water Inspectorate
Health Protection Agency

RESEARCHERS:

Gabriella Rundblad
Paul Hunter
Olivia Knapton
Alastair Cullen
Anne Conde

PROJECT DATES:

September 2008 - June 2010

PROJECT SUMMARY:

The UK Water Industry Act (1991; amended by the Water Act 2003) states that water companies must only supply water that is fit for human consumption (Section 70) and that if a breach of the drinking water standards occurs, they must take appropriate action. Such action naturally includes investigating the breach, its cause, its likely effect on public health and restoring standards. They must also decide whether consumers need be informed about the breach, including whether special advice needs to be issued. If public health is threatened, the three standard notices that could be issued are: 'boil water', 'do not drink' and 'do not use'.

The Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI) reports an increase in water incidents from 92 in 2005 to 99 in 2006. In the majority of cases, only general advice was communicated to affected consumers, and there were no 'do not use' notices in 2005 or 2006. Of relevance here are the 13 and 12 'boil water' notices (in 2005 and 2006 respectively) and the four versus five 'do not drink' notices. Given the severe weather in 2007 in combination with the potential threat of global warming, these figures are likely to increase even further. This means that each year, public health is increasingly at risk from potential waterborne diseases, leaving effective public health communication the main avenue for preventing disease. Despite recent advances in risk communication, the widespread failure to comply with suggested protective measures such as not drinking tap water remains unexplained.

In July-August 2007, some 140,000 households lost their drinking water supply due to flooding of the Mythe water treatment works in Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire. By investigating the Mythe incident, we can explore how and why professionals and the public differentially understand and communicate about risks and their prevention. The combination of conventional research methods with a new cognitive linguistics approach allow use to include a more comprehensive range of potential factors. In particular, the largely ignored role of language will be established. In conjunction with stakeholders, this project ultimately aims to offer new and improved water notices.

If you would like some more information about our project, please contact Olivia Knapton, olivia.knapton@kcl.ac.uk, 020 78483176. We are happy to answer any questions you might have.

PROJECT PHASES:

PHASE 1
January/February 2009, we sent out postal questionnaires to 1000 randomly selected households in Gloucestershire. The aim of the questionniare is to find out what the consumers who lost their drinking water in 2007 due to the Mythe incident remember about the advice they received and what actions they chose or chose not to take. We have finished data collection and data analysis.

PHASE 2
We have carried out interviews with some of our questionnaire participants, and with respresentatives from the media (e.g. BBC Gloucestershire).

PHASE 3
We will do a very detailed language analysis of all the written information that was supplied by the involved agencies and the media.

PHASE 4
We will invite a range of people - consumers, doctors, agency representatives to name a few - to participate in focus groups. Some of our questionnaire participants have already indicated that they wish to participate, but we are also looking for consumers who were did not lose their drinking water in 2007. Please contact us, should you wish to participate (see contact details above).

PROJECT PRESENTATIONS, REPORTS AND ARTICLES:

PRESENTATIONS
We have presented the first results from this study at the Health Protection Agency Conference, 14-16 September 2009, Warwick, UK, and at the American Public Health Association Annual Meeting & Exposition, 7-11 November 2009, Philadelphia, US. Copies of presentations are available here.

REPORTS
Copies of reports will be made available here in due course.

ARTICLES
We have submitted two articles so far based on our questionnaire results. Copies of accepted/published articles will be made available here in due course.

© 2008-2010