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Decision Making in Natural Disasters: An Analysis of Firms’ Strategic Behavior on Economic Resilience and Influence of Hurricane Intensity Forecasts on Evacuation Decisions

Roa-Henriquez, Alfredo R
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1565947147689077

Abstract Details

2019, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Public Policy and Management.
This dissertation is about organizational-level resilience and decision-making in the face of natural hazards. While interest in resilience has accelerated, research multiplied, and the number of policies and implementations of resilience to natural hazards have increased over the last several years, mainly at the level of communities and regions, there has been a dearth of empirical work on resilience at the level of the firm. And although different strategies have been proposed in the supply-chain literature, most of these include resilience actions that must be put in place prior to disruptions. These pre-disaster planning actions are often referred to as “mitigation” in the literature. In this dissertation, I will focus on measuring economic resilience at the level of the firm. The biggest difference between supply-chain resilience and economic resilience is that the latter focuses on resilience actions that can be implemented after a disruption begins whereas the former focuses on actions that must be put in place before a shock. This dissertation will make the major contribution of introducing a resilience strategy that I call resource sharing in the context of economic resilience. This dissertation consists of three main papers. Chapters one and two are studies at the level of the firm. The third chapter is an empirical analysis at the individual level. The first chapter is a theoretical component that provides propositions, conceptualizations and a theoretical framework to understand the relationships between the sharing of resources, the dependence on critical resources on the external environment, and resilience at the level of the organization. The second chapter uses empirical data and a sample selection model to test some hypotheses posed in the first chapter. The objective is to understand how the sharing of resources among organizations is related to economic resilience. Empirical results that are obtained from a sample of firms affected by Superstorm Sandy and Hurricane Harvey indicate that there is unobserved heterogeneity that explains the strategic behavior of firms in the post-disaster and that those firms that are more likely to resource share are also the ones that exhibit higher economic resilience. The third chapter is based on a human subjects experiment aimed at testing the effect of hurricane intensity forecasts on evacuation decision-making in a disaster-preparation context. I hypothesize that decision-makers with more information (i.e., individuals exposed to hurricane intensity forecasts) and decision-makers with less information (i.e., individuals not exposed to hurricane intensity forecasts) exhibit differences in their decision to evacuate, in the accuracy of their decision (i.e., timing), and in their determination for evacuation location. Results indicate that decision makers with more information in the form of forecasts evacuate more frequently and earlier than decision makers exposed to lower levels of information. This chapter has in common with the previous two chapters the analysis of strategic behavior of individual entities (i.e., businesses, emergency management officials) in the context of natural disasters and the study of factors that influence the flow of information in the decision-making process.
Noah Dormady (Advisor)
Greenbaum Robert (Committee Member)
Chen Zhenhua (Committee Member)
157 p.
Management; Public Policy
Economic Resilience, Resource Sharing, Resource Dependence, Hurricane Intensity Forecast, Evacuation Decision

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Citations

  • Roa-Henriquez, A. R. (2019). Decision Making in Natural Disasters: An Analysis of Firms’ Strategic Behavior on Economic Resilience and Influence of Hurricane Intensity Forecasts on Evacuation Decisions [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1565947147689077

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Roa-Henriquez, Alfredo. Decision Making in Natural Disasters: An Analysis of Firms’ Strategic Behavior on Economic Resilience and Influence of Hurricane Intensity Forecasts on Evacuation Decisions . 2019. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1565947147689077.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Roa-Henriquez, Alfredo. "Decision Making in Natural Disasters: An Analysis of Firms’ Strategic Behavior on Economic Resilience and Influence of Hurricane Intensity Forecasts on Evacuation Decisions ." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1565947147689077

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1565947147689077
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This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.