Confidence in authorities, neighborhood cohesion and natural hazards preparedness in Taiwan

Abstract

Household preparedness is important for resilience building and disaster risk reduction. Limited studies have explored the correlations between confidence in authorities, neighborhood cohesion, and natural disaster preparedness, especially in the eastern cultural context. This study investigates the associations between confidence in authorities, neighborhood cohesion, and household disaster preparedness actions in Taiwan - a natural-hazards-prone region. Poisson and logit regression models are constructed to estimate the correlations by analyzing an updated and representative 2013 Taiwan Social Change Survey open data with the control of necessary confounding variables (e.g., disaster experience, risk perception, and demographic characteristics). The results show that, when controlling confounding variables, households with a higher degree of confidence in authorities and neighborhood cohesion degree are still more likely to adopt more preparedness activities, but not necessarily more likely to conduct each specific preparedness activity (e.g., purchase disaster insurance). These findings bridge the gap of current knowledge about the role of perceptions of stakeholders' characteristics in motivating the public's preparedness for disasters and emergencies.