Timothy L. Sellnow - Theorizing Crisis Communication

While a number of communication variables have been described as central to the effectiveness of warning messages, the credibility and quality of the information included, as well as the general form and consistency of the message appear to be particularly important. Timing and width of diffusion are also fundamental to effectiveness. Thus, warning messages combine important elements of information exchange persuasion and decision making into an integrated system. Integration appears to be an important feature of these systems.

These models are consistent in describing warning as a process and do so in a manner largely consistent with other broad notions of communication processes. While some are more linear or actional in their characterizations, all view the audiences as active receivers and interpreters of warning messages. Some models more fully integrate the idea that audiences may seek out additional information from alternative sources or seek to validate the warning and co-create an understanding of the risk. These constitute more interactional or transactional views of the warning as a dynamic and complex communication process.

As Rogers and Sorensen (1991) note, people respond to warnings based on their prior experiences, their associated beliefs, and the social and psychological context of the warning. Given the rapidly changing nature of risk beliefs and experiences, changing technologies, and the dynamics of larger social-psychological contexts, theories of warnings must be flexible. The emergence of social media is changing how warnings are disseminated and warning theories do not currently account for this dynamic, interactive, and highly networked form of communication.

For example, these models all frame the warning process as one moving in a more or less linear way from an initial stimulus, usually from a single sender, to some protective behavior as response, with various intervening stages. Social media creates the opportunity for audiences and the public to become the creators of warning messages and simultaneously to send and receive warning messages. These messages may sidestep traditional response agencies and, in many cases, inform the agencies of the emerging threat. This dynamic and transactional form of warning is at least conceptually inconsistent with a notion of the warning as a linear, sender- and message-centered process.

Several other approaches to warnings have been offered, including more generalized risk communication models such as EPPM (Witte, 1992), the health belief model (Rosenstock et al., 1988), and the theory of reasoned action (Dutta-Bergman, 2005). Risk communication as a more generalized effort to communicate risks and the more specialized form of warning communication overlap. In addition, the Internalization, Distribution, Explanation, Action (IDEA) model, discussed in Chapter 10, focuses on the instructional elements of warning messages (Sellnow et al., 2017). These elements are important parts of warning messages in that they facilitate action. Finally, the principles of self and collective efficacy (Benight, 2004; Benight et al., 2000) are important factors in the success of warning messages.

Alerts and warnings are critical to the management of risks and, in many cases, are the only tools available to significantly limit and mitigate harm to the public. Warnings are specialized communication and decisional systems characterized by the primary variables of uncertainty, timing, and width of diffusion. While warnings models and theories have all sought to describe and model warnings as interactive processes and more than simple stimulus response frameworks, the evolving nature of media, technology, and the public – including its experience and understanding of risk – suggest more work is needed to capture the complex and dynamic nature of warning systems.

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