Community and agency perspectives on community mental/emotional disaster risk and preparedness: A qualitative community and agency study

Psychological preparedness – the ability to manage the body’s stress response during a disaster experience – can help people make better decisions in rapidly changing conditions. Without it, even the best physical plans and preparations can go awry. Despite its importance, there is little consensus on the best terms, formats and content for enhancing this type of preparedness. We spoke with residents of the Bundaberg region and emergency and disaster service personnel to understand what works, when and why for increasing psychological preparedness. We asked residents to provide feedback on 3 currently available brochures/websites on psychological preparedness from the Red Cross, the Queensland Government and the Australian Psychological Society. In brief, what did residents and agency personnel say about engaging people and increasing their self-efficacy in psychological preparedness?