UI study examines social media usage during disaster
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (WCIA) — A professor at the University of Illinois is unveiling the power social media can have in disaster events.
Omar Pérez Figueroa is an urban and regional planning professor who researches environmental inequalities in underserved communities. This includes water governance and disaster resilience. For a new study, Pérez Figueroa gathered more than 2,000 statuses from Twitter — now called X — from before, during, and after Hurricane María hit Puerto Rico in 2017.
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The goal of the study was to analyze the reactions of Twitter users, and how they can make people better prepared for disaster. To accomplish this, Pérez Figueroa identified three main categories of messages from the samples.
The first was ground-reporting in Puerto Rico. These posts consisted of locals who were documenting the event and informing others of their condition and location.
Another category involved discussion of the socio-political issues that made the hurricane disastrous. Pérez Figueroa said many of these tweets blamed the local and federal governments for their slow and inefficient response. This social media use demonstrated its ability to rally others and urge prompt government responses.
The third and final category included emotional messages seeking help or expressing support. These posts highlighted how social media could raise awareness and donations from those who may or may not be directly affected.
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In addition to observing what users were posting, Pérez Figueroa also looked at when and where they were posting. He found that most tweets were made before landfall. Some of the sampled tweets also talked about the Guajataca Dam failure in real time. The dam was hit and damaged by Hurricane María, leading to the evacuation of 70,000 residents.
Tweets from Puerto Rico and places in the U.S. with large Puerto Rican populations — like Florida, California, New York and Texas — were considered in the sampling. Pérez Figueroa said that despite the collapse of the island’s power grid, users in Puerto Rico were still able to access Twitter during the hurricane. He believes this is because Twitter does not require a strong signal to use, making it more reliable under extreme conditions.
Pérez Figueroa wrote that the ability to quickly obtain urgent information in dangerous conditions can literally be a matter of life and death. Social media may be one of our best tools when it comes to disaster response and resilience — especially as it becomes more of a mainstream news source for the public — so he believes it’s important to expand access in remote areas.
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In the future, Pérez Figueroa wants researchers to delve into how traditional media can influence social media discussions, how narratives differ between the two platforms, whether social media creates more urgency in disaster response from policy makers and emergency responders and how social media users of socioeconomic levels utilize their platforms during disasters. He also hopes that public health and disaster response organizations can use his findings to better understand risk communication on social media, and how it can help minimize public health emergencies in widespread disasters.
The study is published in the Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences.
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