Public attention during Hurricanes Florence and Michael

Abstract

In 2018, Hurricanes Florence and Michael affected the southeastern portion of the United States with widespread impacts in Florida, North and South Carolina, Georgia, and Virginia. The two storms were markedly different in terms of their meteorological history: Hurricane Florence made landfall as a Category 1 storm approximately two weeks after formation, while Hurricane Michael made landfall as an “unprecedented” Category 5 storm just three days after formation. The stark meteorological differences provided the opportunity to explore whether and to what extent public attention is influenced by storm severity. This study utilized both direct (i.e., tweet volume, search volume) and indirect (i.e., number of newspaper articles) measures to explore public attention at different scales. The results found that Hurricane Florence received more attention than Hurricane Michael, both regionally and nationally, across all three measures. The findings also underscore the importance of time for the process of attention-building, especially at the national-level. Taken together, the results suggest that storm severity, forecast lead-time, previous meteorological history, and population density intersect with one another to influence public attention in complex ways. The paper concludes with some opportunities for future research that may provide additional insights into the linkages between attention, perception, and decision-making.