Storm psychology: Why do some people stay behind? - updated 8/31/2012

In a newspaper article, some people said they didn't expect it would be too bad, because it was just a category 1 hurricane. They didn't realize there would be so much rain. Because of global warming, the air has more moisture, and when it meets cooler air, we are getting more precipitation.

http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/08/30/13551209-storm-psychology-why-do-some-people-stay-behind?lite

8/30/2012 By Melissa Dahl

It’s the question so many of us have while watching news coverage of a hurricane or tropical storm like Isaac: Who are these people who don’t leave home even as an angry storm is advancing – and what are they thinking?!

The short answer: For some, the up-and-leaving idea isn’t as easy as it sounds to those of us watching from a safe and dry distance. Actually, a 2009 article published in the journal Psychological Science sought to examine the reasons some people won’t evacuate, despite the urging or even mandates of city and state officials, by asking a group who would know: Hurricane Katrina survivors who weathered the storm at home.

“It seems like asking ‘Why didn't people leave?’ presumes that that's the best option for everyone to make,” says Hilary Bergsieker, who worked with Nicole Stephens, now of Northwestern University, on the study. The fact is, many people lack the resources to escape. Having no money, no mode of transportation and no friends or family in safe places means no choice but to weather the storm.

In the case of Katrina, those who evacuated before the storm hit were mostly white, mostly middle class; on the other hand, those who stayed were mostly black, mostly working class. The “leavers,” as the Psychological Science paper terms those who fled before the storm, had privileges that they probably took for granted: more education, more money, reliable access to transportation, social networks that extended farther away from the hurricane-hit area, and more access to news reports to warn them of the storm’s severity.

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“There's sort of the physical resources factor, but there's also the psychological factors. That's your world; that's all you know,” says Bergsieker, who is now an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. And, as the thinking goes, if your neighbor tells you he’s staying, then you might stay, too – after all, if something happened to him, who would be there to take care of him if you leave? Some of the 79 Katrina survivors interviewed in the 2009 study did have the resources to go, but they didn’t have the heart to leave.

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