Survey to analyze the general knowledge of Brazilians about lightning

Abstract

This paper presents the result of the same model of survey applied in Malaysia and Brazil, two countries with a high keraunic density of lightning in most territory. This survey had as main objective to be applied to a lay public and with little technical knowledge about lightning in order to verify the general knowledge of the population and its main beliefs and myths. The questionnaire was released to be answered through the Google Form tool. The total number of responses obtained was 928, the vast majority by people from the state of São Paulo (~70%) and with a high level of education (~80% with higher or postgraduate degrees). This sampling was not very good because we would like to have a more comprehensive sampling in terms of the various Brazilian states and also regarding the education that did not reflect the Brazilian population in general. Thus, the research result was impaired, reflecting only a small part of the Brazilian population. Despite this, for the public that the research reached, even with high education, the result of the research suggests the need for a great effort of communication about the dangers that involve the occurrence of lightning and the good practices of behavior in front of them. At this point, there is a divergence from the Malaysian survey, which has a more uniform instruction and the same level of responses.