A scoping review of post-disaster social support investigations conducted after disasters that struck the Australia and Oceania continent

This scoping review provides a summary of research findings on social support dynamics in the wake of disasters that occurred on the continent of Australia and Oceania between 1983 and 2013. Forty-one studies, quantitative and qualitative, were summarised, investigating different facets of post-disaster supportive interactions. All inquiries assessed disasters resulting from natural hazards, with the majority of them conducted following events in Australia and New Zealand. The review revealed similar patterns of post-disaster social support dynamics that routinely unfold after disastrous incidents all over the world. Consistent with the disaster mental health literature, the documentation of social support mobilisation and social support deterioration processes was common. Salutary direct effects of supportive behaviours on post-disaster psychological distress were also highly evident. Most studies, however, posed research questions or hypotheses that lacked empirical or theoretical grounding. In conclusion, the review offers several recommendations on how to advance research on post-disaster social support.     

Flooding and schools: experiences in Hull in 2007

Hull, a city in the East Riding of Yorkshire, United Kingdom, suffered severe flooding in June 2007, affecting some 8,600 households and most schools. Despite the potential for damage in such disasters, no studies of the effects of floods on teachers and schools in the UK appear to have been published previously. This study analysed the impacts of the floods on teachers in Hull in two stages: first through correspondence with Hull City Council and a mailed questionnaire to 91 head teachers of primary, secondary, and special schools; and second, through in‐depth interviews with head teachers from six flooded schools, representing different degrees of flood experience, and a questionnaire completed by eight teachers from the same schools. The findings reveal the importance and the complexity of the role of the school in the wider community in a time of crisis. The study highlights issues concerning preparedness for floods, support for schools, and flood protection for schools.     

Spatial cost–benefit analysis of blue restoration and factors driving net benefits globally

Marine coastal ecosystems, commonly referred to as blue ecosystems, provide valuable services to society but are under increasing threat worldwide due to a variety of drivers, including eutrophication, development, land-use change, land reclamation, and climate change. Ecological restoration is sometimes necessary to facilitate recovery in coastal ecosystems. Blue restoration (i.e., in marine coastal systems) is a developing field, and projects to date have been small scale and expensive, leading to the perception that restoration may not be economically viable. We conducted a global cost–benefit analysis to determine the net benefits of restoring coral reef, mangrove, saltmarsh, and seagrass ecosystems, where the benefit is defined as the monetary value of ecosystem services. We estimated costs from published restoration case studies and used an adjusted-value-transfer method to assign benefit values to these case studies. Benefit values were estimated as the monetary value provided by ecosystem services of the restored habitats. Benefits outweighed costs (i.e., there were positive net benefits) for restoration of all blue ecosystems. Mean benefit:cost ratios for ecosystem restoration were eight to 10 times higher than prior studies of coral reef and seagrass restoration, most likely due to the more recent lower cost estimates we used. Among ecosystems, saltmarsh had the greatest net benefits followed by mangrove; coral reef and seagrass ecosystems had lower net benefits. In general, restoration in nations with middle incomes had higher (eight times higher in coral reefs and 40 times higher in mangroves) net benefits than those with high incomes. Within an ecosystem type, net benefit varied with restoration technique (coral reef and saltmarsh), ecosystem service produced (mangrove and saltmarsh), and project duration (seagrass). These results challenge the perceptions of the low economic viability of blue restoration and should encourage further targeted investment in this field.     

Aerosols and environmental pollution

The number of publications on atmospheric aerosols has dramatically increased in recent years. This review, predominantly from a European perspective, summarizes the current state of knowledge of the role played by aerosols in environmental pollution and, in addition, highlights gaps in our current knowledge. Aerosol particles are ubiquitous in the Earth’s atmosphere and are central to many environmental issues; ranging from the Earth’s radiative budget to human health. Aerosol size distribution and chemical composition are crucial parameters that determine their dynamics in the atmosphere. Sources of aerosols are both anthropogenic and natural ranging from vehicular emissions to dust resuspension. Ambient concentrations of aerosols are elevated in urban areas with lower values at rural sites. A comprehensive understanding of aerosol ambient characteristics requires a combination of measurements and modeling tools. Legislation for ambient aerosols has been introduced at national and international levels aiming to protect human health and the environment.     

From Food Justice to a Tool of the Status Quo: Three Sub-movements Within Local Food

The local food movement has been touted by some as a profoundly effective way to make our food system become more healthy, just, and sustainable. Others have criticized the movement as being less a challenge to the status quo and more an easily co-opted support offering just another set of choices for affluent consumers. In this paper, we analyze three distinct sub-movements within the local food movement, the individual-focused sub-movement, the systems-focused sub-movement, and the community-focused sub-movement. These movements can be combined within any particular campaign or within the goals of any particular organization or individual activist, but they are nevertheless quite different from each other, and come out of different conceptualizations of what food, people, and locality are. We argue that most of the critiques leveled against local food are actually directed against the individual-focused sub-movement, which is most compatible with the current industrial food system, and perhaps not surprisingly receives the most mainstream attention. Further, we argue that while each movement has its own strengths and weaknesses, it is the community-focused sub-movement that has the most potential to radically transform the global food system.     

Assessing environmentally significant effects: a better strength-of-evidence than a single P value?

Interpreting a P value from a traditional nil hypothesis test as a strength-of-evidence for the existence of an environmentally important difference between two populations of continuous variables (e.g. a chemical concentration) has become commonplace. Yet, there is substantial literature, in many disciplines, that faults this practice. In particular, the hypothesis tested is virtually guaranteed to be false, with the result that P depends far too heavily on the number of samples collected (the ‘sample size’). The end result is a swinging burden-of-proof (permissive at low sample size but precautionary at large sample size). We propose that these tests be reinterpreted as direction detectors (as has been proposed by others, starting from 1960) and that the test’s procedure be performed simultaneously with two types of equivalence tests (one testing that the difference that does exist is contained within an interval of indifference, the other testing that it is beyond that interval—also known as bioequivalence testing). This gives rise to a strength-of-evidence procedure that lends itself to a simple confidence interval interpretation. It is accompanied by a strength-of-evidence matrix that has many desirable features: not only a strong/moderate/dubious/weak categorisation of the results, but also recommendations about the desirability of collecting further data to strengthen findings.     

Welfare states and environmental states: a comparative analysis

A framework is presented for thinking about state intervention in developed capitalist economies in two domains: social policy and environmental policy (and, within that, climate-change policy). Five drivers of welfare state development are identified, the ‘five Is’ of Industrialisation: Interests, Institutions, Ideas/Ideologies, and International Influences. Research applying this framework to the postwar development of welfare states in the OECD is summarised, distinguishing two periods: up to 1980, and from 1980 to 2008. How far this framework can contribute to understanding the rise and differential patterns of environmental governance and intervention across advanced capitalist states since 1970 is explored, before briefly comparing and contrasting the determinants of welfare states and environmental states, identifying common drivers in both domains and regime-specific drivers in each. The same framework is then applied to developments since 2008 and into the near future, sketching two potential configurations and speculating on the conditions for closer, more integrated ‘eco-welfare states’.     

Climate change adaptation strategies for transportation infrastructure in Prince George,Canada

Transport infrastructure is particularly vulnerable to climate impacts as it is designed for long operational lives, and both episodic and seasonal conditions contribute to deterioration, disruption and unsafe incidents. There are some examples of adaptation in transportation design, but many communities do not have the capacity to incorporate climate change considerations into infrastructure planning and management. Researchers worked closely with the City of Prince George, in Central British Columbia, Canada, to build on existing work and explore how the City could plan, design, and maintain roads and other structures to account for climate change. A local steering committee was formed, and created and evaluated 23 potential research topics. Two focus areas were selected for further investigation and explored during a workshop with practitioners, researchers, consultants and other representatives. The workshop precipitated an investigation of projected impacts of climate change on road maintenance and road safety, and plans to explore alternative paving techniques. Outcomes of the case study provide insights regarding climate change and local transportation infrastructure, including: how researchers can engage with local experts to explore adaptation; issues local governments perceive as important; and barriers communities face as they attempt to address vulnerabilities.