Risk perception and behavioral intentions in facing compound climate-related hazards

Abstract

Summary: Compound climate-related events are a complex combination of climate drivers and hazards leading to a significant impact on natural and anthropic systems. Owing to their complexity and critical consequences, interdisciplinary undertaking is required to improve risk analysis, management, and communication. Although prior research in cognitive sciences extensively investigated risk perception in case of a single hazard, the analysis of compound hazards perception is still an open issue. Here, based on cognitive psychology insights, we empirically investigate how individuals' risk perception is shaped by the subjective relevance attributed to different causal cues entailed in a compound event scenario. The results revealed that the subjective validity assigned to specific evidence presented in the composite scenario leads perceived risk related to one of the outcomes (i.e., flooding and wildfire) to prevail over the other. Moreover, the relevance of different cues is likely to affect participants’ automatic behavioral intentions (stay at home vs. evacuation).

Keywords

• Hazard communication
• Decision science
• Psychology
• Research methodology social sciences