Application of Protection Motivation Fear Appeals Theory in Promoting Safety Culture against Earthquake

Lack of enough awareness about the right ways of finding shelter, principles of building construction, structural and non-structural retrofitting, lack of enough information about the active faults and earthquakes knowledge are among those issues which impose financial and non-financial expenses on a country after an earthquake. Making an attitude correction and forming new beliefs and behaviors in public opinion may considerably decrease earthquake loss and damages and enhance the state safety against earthquake. In this regard, using methods of communication and persuasion leads to new beliefs and consequently attitude change. A common method of persuasion and making attitude change in people is to create fear in them so that the fear conducts them from a passive stance towards action and new behavior. This paper deals with Ahar-Varzaghan earthquake as a fear-inducing message for Tabriz -a city near the epicenter of the earthquake- civilians and the limit of their attitude and behavior change, after receiving this alerting message, was evaluated. The research method of this paper is survey and the data was gathered by questionnaires, distributed randomly among 385 Tabriz civilians.