ABSTRACT
It is a critical component of professional emergency management and public safety operations to be aware of various hazards and threats within a given community. This awareness is typically established through formalized assessments that look at a combination of likelihood and vulnerability to the identified hazards. For example, a landlocked community does not have to worry about the presence of tsunamis. Likewise, communities with high sea-level elevation have minimal concern for flooding. However, these examples are highly simplistic and do not take into account the true complexity of individual communities that have various levels of economic, social, cultural, and political influences that may increase or reduce the actual risk. Likewise, the perception of those same risks can significantly alter individual and community preparedness and mitigation of those risks, which may or may not be appropriate for a given area. This chapter will focus on these perceptions and how they are changing in current and future considerations.
