CRRC Project Task III Workshop July 24-25, 2013 Petersen room, Allen Library University of Washington, Seattle DRAFT DISCUSSION PAPERS Please do not cite or circulate without permission Table of Contents Stakeholder and public mental models of and concerns about dispersant and oil spill processes………………………………………………………Page 2 What-If Scenario Modeling to Support Oil Spill Preparedness and Response Decision Making………………………………………………………………..Page 28 “It’s Raining Oil”: Information Flow through Twitter after the 2010 Deepwater HoriZon Oil Spill ……………………………………………….Page 47 Methods for communicating the complexity and uncertainty of response actions………………………………………………………………..………….Page 77 Best Practices for Community and Stakeholder Engagement in Oil Spill Preparedness and Response……………………………………………...Page 97 SEA-UW CRRC Workshop July 24-25, 2013 Drafts Page 2 Discussion Draft – 15 July 2013 Stakeholder and public mental models of and concerns (all concerns, including environmental and public health) about dispersant and oil spill processes (leads Ann Bostrom and Ann Hayward Walker). DISCUSSION DRAFT July 15, 2013 Section I. Preface Experience with stakeholders and the public on oil spills and dispersant issues from 1980 through the Deepwater Horizon has shown that communicating about dispersants has long been and remains a problem across the country (Walker 2012, 2011a, 2011b, 2011c, 2010, 2001a, 2001b, 1999, 1997; Bostrom et al 1995 and 1996; Pavia 1984, 1985). Further, high quality information to support decision making is one of the perceived goals of oil spill response (Tuler et al 2008). The research presented here represents one piece of a collaborative social science and natural science research project designed to address public, media and political concerns and develop preparedness recommendations and response tools to facilitate well-balanced decisions under the uncertain conditions of risk that spills represent. Natural science communications can benefit from data-driven social science research and collaborations between the two can lead to new breakthroughs (Schaal, 2012). To develop strategies for engaging communities and individuals in discussions about spill issues, the overarching project builds on a mental models approach for risk communications and entails a relatively new approach to survey research, analysis of social media data, and integration of relevant social and natural science research findings. The project has three subsidiary objectives: (1) identify key information needs and areas of confusion and misunderstanding, (2) explore the role of social media in effective risk communication, and (3) identify better methods to communicate scientific uncertainty and complexity with respect to response alternatives. Results from survey research and analysis of Deepwater Horizon Twitter data inform the team’s approach for characterizing model constituencies and their communication needs as they relate to dispersants and oil spills. The results are intended to be immediately applicable to promote effective response communications about dispersants and oil spills. Project end users include Unified Command (Federal and State On-scene Coordinators and spillers known as Responsible Parties), dispersant decision makers from coastal Regional Response Teams (RRTs), and academia. Many of these key stakeholders are looked to by elected officials/politicians and the public for assurance about oil spill response options. Section 2. Introduction to Mental Models research Successful risk management and risk communication depend on knowledge of fears, needs, and values of intended audiences ahead of crafting and delivering risk communication messages (Levine and Picou 2012). A mental models approach is well suited to elicitation of local community expertise on the workings of the local marine environment to produce valued goods and services, how pollutants affect that production, how best to deal with pollution, perceptions regarding environmental tradeoffs, e.g. Funding for this project was provided by the University of New Hampshire’s Coastal Response Research Center 1 (NOAA Grant Number: NA07NOS4630143. Contract: 13-003) SEA-UW CRRC Workshop July 24-25, 2013 Drafts Page 3 Discussion Draft – 15 July 2013 opportunities and limitations (or risks and benefits), and associated preferences and tradeoffs regarding dispersant use in event of a spill. Key stakeholders and members of the public in the Gulf of Mexico and other states hold a variety of risk perceptions and mental models of dispersant and oil spill processes (e.g., Gill et al 2012; Webler and Lord, 2010, Walker 2011c). As a result of the Deepwater Horizon (DWH) incident, many may hold correct and sophisticated beliefs regarding dispersant and oil spill processes and recognize the relevant scientific uncertainties, but findings from a workshop earlier this year (Walker, 2012) show that some of their mental models omit key elements, and may focus unduly on elements that contribute relatively little to potential risk. A mental model is someone's understanding of how something works in the real world. Such misperceptions of natural processes associated with the lifecycle of an oil spill and dispersants can influence risk perceptions and public health (CRRC 2012). To assess mental models, information needs, and risk perceptions of lay stakeholders, this research builds on a mental models risk communication approach. This approach reflects both the natural and engineering sciences of how risks are created and controlled, and the social and behavioral sciences of how people comprehend and respond to such risks (Morgan et al 2002). The approach entails developing a decision-focused expert model of dispersant and oil spill processes, in order to identify correct beliefs as well as misperceptions that influence oil spill response decisions. Comparing layperson mental models with an expert decision model can provide insights about information gaps and misunderstanding, which in turn help identify knowledge areas to address, thus supporting more effective communications. By recognizing people’s concerns and prior beliefs, a mental models approach can improve ways of communicating complex scientific information, such as that about oil spills and dispersant use, and empower informed decision making (Fischhoff et al., 2011). Mental models approaches belong to a larger category of qualitative research approaches to better understand stakeholder beliefs and perceptions concerning risk (Wood et al., 2012). The aim of such research is to discover how people think about an issue, in order to assess how new information will be interpreted so it can be designed to be most useful. Mental models are important as they are people’s “inference engines” and show how people connect contexts or ideas (e.g., Gentner and Stevens, 1983). Mental models of hazardous processes include ideas people have about identifying a risk, exposure to the risk, the effects of exposure, how to mitigate the risk, and how the risk unfolds in time. Communicating risk is much like creating a forecast; there are many factors to consider. Humans perceive risk in many ways, emotionally, socially, as well as cognitively. The most basic way of perceiving risk is the use of one’s emotions or feelings to evaluate risks and benefits (Slovic et al., 2002). In addition to differences in feelings about risk, social and cultural differences influence perceptions of risk; these differences are associated with variations in beliefs about the role of government (Kahan et al., 2007). Funding for this project was provided by the University of New Hampshire’s Coastal Response Research Center 2 (NOAA Grant Number: NA07NOS4630143. Contract: 13-003) SEA-UW CRRC Workshop July 24-25, 2013 Drafts Page 4 Discussion Draft – 15 July 2013 These influences, however, are only part of the picture, and understanding them is not a sufficient basis for determining what information might be useful to or desired by decision makers and should be made accessible for them. It’s important to recognize that how people process information cognitively also affects their individual risk perceptions (e.g. Peters & Levin, 2008; Reyna et al., 2009); their prior beliefs—that is, their mental models—influence their risk perceptions and decision making (e.g., Bostrom et al., 2012), as well as how they interpret new information. The mental models approach in this research has five steps, as described in detail by Bostrom et al. (1992) and Morgan et al. (1992; 2002). This approach has been applied successfully in a wide variety of domains [e.g., dispersant communications (Bostrom et al., 1995), flashfloods (Wagner, 2007), injury prevention (Austin and Fischhoff, 2011), and wildland fire (Zaksek and Arvai, 2004), among others]. The project leverages extensive work on most of the five steps, completed previously (e.g., Bostrom, Fischbeck, Kucklick, Walker 1995). Prior research had revealed a lack of shared understanding among decision makers about oil properties and fate and transport, even before the addition of dispersants (e.g., Bostrom et al 1996; Scholz et al 1999). Section 3. Research methods 3.1 Expert decision model Members of the research developed an expert decision model for dispersant use in oil spill response through expert elicitation in the late 1990’s and 2012 (see Appendix A, include expert model and list of experts who participated). At both time points the experts involved in the elicitation were among those in the nation most expert in the sciences of oil