This is a small grant for exploratory research to gather data on how the global communication network functioned around Hurricane Katrina, in terms of its use by various social groups. This timely research will provide insights into how emergency warning messages can be propagated through the social network. It will start by building an understanding of the nature of the communication network in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, including connections with global communication networks, and the nature of the social group structure that overlay this communication network. The basic research questions to be addressed are: building models of how information flows in a communication network and taking into account the "trustability" of the information.
The enormity of the tragedy following Hurricane Katrina indicates a failure in an apparently otherwise well functioning global communication network, wired and wireless. Despite the fact that two to three days before Hurricane Katrina hit, the level of danger was known and broadcast, a large fraction of the population and the local administration did not trust the forecasts enough to take action. Technology by itself cannot ensure that the data are processed into information and delivered in a timely fashion in a form that is meaningful to the user and of value in emergency response decision-making. A significant component of how information flows through the society is intertwined with the social network dynamics of the society.
Individuals will not act upon information unless they consider the information trustworthy. This fact takes on special significance during a time of technological transition, as traditional mass media like newspapers and network television are supplemented or supplanted by online news and other computer-enabled communication media. The theoretical approach of this research postulates that there must be multiple trustworthy paths from the source of the information to the individual before some action is taken. This idea is used to build new measures of the quality of a social communication network relating to how well it will perform in conveying emergency warning messages. In turn, these measures can provide specific recommendations regarding how the network could be improved.
