Self-efficacy and barriers to disaster evacuation in Hong Kong.

OBJECTIVES

To investigate specific challenges to Hong Kong's capacity for effective disaster response, we assessed perceived barriers to evacuation and citizens' self-efficacy.

METHODS

Global positioning system software was used to determine random sampling locations across Hong Kong, weighted by population density. The resulting sample of 1023 participants (46.5% female, mean age 40.74 years) were invited to complete questionnaires on emergency preparedness, barriers to evacuation and self-efficacy. Latent profile analysis and multinomial logistic regression were used to identify self-efficacy profiles and predictors of profile membership.

RESULTS

Only 11% of the sample reported feeling prepared to respond to a disaster. If asked to evacuate in an emergency, 41.9% of the sample cited significant issues that would preclude them from doing so. Self-efficacy was negatively associated with barriers to disaster response so that participants reporting higher levels of self-efficacy cited fewer perceived barriers to evacuation.

CONCLUSIONS

Hong Kong has established effective strategies for emergency response, but concerns regarding evacuation and mobilisation remain. The findings indicate that improving self-efficacy for disaster response has potential to increase evacuation readiness.