Abstract
Abstract. Disaster preparedness is critical for reducing potential impact. This paper contributes to current knowledge of disaster preparedness using representative national sample data from China, which faces high earthquake risks in many areas of the country. The adoption of earthquake preparedness activities by the general public, including five indicators of material preparedness and five indicators of awareness preparedness, were surveyed and 3245 respondents from all 31 provinces of Mainland China participated in the survey. Linear regression models and logit regression models were used to analyze the effects of potential influencing factors. Overall, the preparedness levels are not satisfied, with a material preparation score of 3.02 (1–5), and awareness preparation score of 2.79 (1–5), nationally. Meanwhile, residents from western China, which has higher earthquake risk, have higher degrees of preparedness. The concern for disaster risk reduction (DRR) and the concern for building safety and participation in public affairs are consistent positive predictors of both material and awareness preparedness. The demographic and socioeconomic variables' effects, such as gender, age, education, income, urban/rural division, and building size, vary according to different preparedness activities. Finally, the paper concludes with a discussion of the theoretical contribution and potential implementation.
Highlights
China is a country with high seismic risk
Based on the data from China Earthquake Network Centre (CENC), there were 130 earthquakes between M 6 and 7, 16 quakes between M 7 and 8, and two earthquakes higher than M 8 occurred in Mainland China since 1980, and most of the M ≥ 6.0 earthquake occurred in western China and rarely occurred in the eastern area
An exploratory study from Istanbul explored the association between earthquake preparedness and demographic variables like age, education, financial income, gender, etc., only using cross-tabulated tables, and the results showed that earthquake preparedness in this region had minor variations (Eraybar et al, 2010)
Summary
China is a country with high seismic risk. Though China only covers about 7 % of the land area in the world, it has more than 35 % of M ≥ 7 continental earthquakes. In China, 58 % of the whole land area, more than 50 % of the cities and more than 70 % of the urban population are located in an area with high seismic risk – in the seismic zone with VII intensity degree or above (Gao et al, 2015). Though most recent earthquakes occurred in the western region, the eastern area with high population intensity is not free of danger. It can be concluded that seismic risk is a threat to most areas of China, and national studies covering all of China are needed
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