Search

Global warming and climate change pose serious risks for ecological and social systems worldwide. Vietnam, due to its exposed geographical location and socio-economical context, has been recognized as one of the countries that is most severely affected by climate change. The IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report concluded that human influence is mostly likely the dominant cause of the observed global warming. The UNFCCC’s Conference of the Parties in 2015 set a target of keeping global temperature increase within 2oC in comparison to the pre-industrialized era to ensure that the world climate system will not collapse. Addressing the consequences of climate change requires both mitigation and adaptation. Moreover, understanding climate change risks appears to be a communication challenge in addressing the determinants of risk negligence, especially among the groups who fail to exercise appropriate responses against the anthropogenic causes and expected consequences. Therefore, climate change communication is important to raise awareness, to garner support for collective initiatives, and to motivate individual action. The main objectives of this thesis are to understand which factors influence flood and climate change risk perceptions and efficacy towards responding to flood and climate risks among different groups of people living in the coastal and delta communities in Vietnam. The thesis also aims to test message framing methods to effectively communicate flood and climate change risks for behavioural changes toward mitigation and adaptation. Several conceptual frameworks were developed or adapted based on existing theories around risk perceptions, efficacy, and communication. The principle data collection method applied in all studies is quantitative with a total sample of 2299 inhabitants in coastal and delta communities in Vietnam. Regarding flood and climate change risk perceptions, Chapter 2 and 3 showed that while pairwise analyses revealed a significant a

Climate change makes coastal communities more vulnerable to floods associated with storm surges and sea level rise, requiring both adaptation and mitigation measures. Moreover, proper understanding of flood risks and their potential impacts on climate change appears to be a communication challenge. In climate change communication, the effect of framing congruency on perception of risk, efficacy and behavioural intentions towards climate change adaptation and mitigation has received limited attention. Messages have not been congruent in framing risks associated with climate change. We define congruency as the coherent alignment of several aspects of message content. Messages are considered congruent when they provide recipients with consistent contents such as giving concrete and actionable advice, or by providing more abstract and general background information. This research focuses on climate change communication in fostering mitigation behaviours among adolescents in vulnerable locations in the global South. Based on Construal Level Theory, this paper investigates how message congruency affects the link between perceptions of climate change risk and efficacy and two predictors of behavioural change: perceived responsibility and mitigation intentions. We conducted an experiment to test the effect of congruent vs. incongruent risk communication among adolescents in highly vulnerable coastal communities in the Mekong Delta in Vietnam (N = 348). Multiple regression analysis found strong effects of congruency in message framing; when messages were congruent in the content, communicative interventions changed adolescents’ perceptions and attitudes toward climate change mitigation more consistently. This research contributes both theoretically and practically to risk communication among adolescents and toward climate change mitigation behaviour.

This article contributes to current research about determinants of climate change and flood risk perception, and intentions to take adaptive measures. We propose a research model that distinguishes between vulnerability and severity components of perceived risks, and adds perceived adaptive capacity as a third factor to predict the intention to take adaptive measures. We used this combined model as a conceptual lens for an explorative survey among 1086 residents of coastal and delta communities in Vietnam. Pairwise analyses revealed a significant association of flood and climate change risk perceptions with individual’s flood experience, climate change knowledge, frequency of community participation and socio-demographic factors. However, in multivariate analysis, the influence of most socio-demographic factors became weak or patchy. Flood experience was the most influential driver of flood-related risk perceptions but weak for climate change-related risk perceptions and behavioural intentions. Knowledge strongly increased the intention to adapt to flood and climate risks and the perceived vulnerability to and severity of climate change risks, but reduced the perceived capacity to adapt to climate risks. Frequency of community participation increased the perceived vulnerability and severity of climate change risks, the intention to adapt to both climate and flood risks and the perceived capacity to adapt to flood risks, but reduced the perceived capacity to adapt to climate risks. Our research confirms earlier findings that individuals’ knowledge, place-specific experience and social-cultural influences are key predictors of both flood and climate change risk perceptions and intentions to take adaptive measures. These factors should therefore receive ample attention in climate risk communication.

Full Text, Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Medical Science, Griffith Health, Background Over 80% of children experience acute otitis media (AOM) at least once during childhood, with 10-30% of children experiencing recurrent episodes of AOM (RAOM) or persistence of fluid in the middle ear (ME) lasting greater than 3 months which is defined as chronic otitis media with effusion (COME). Microbial infection remains the main cause of AOM, however the causes of RAOM and COME are not fully understood. Heavy loads of microbial colonisation and bacterial/viral interaction in the upper respiratory tract (URT) contribute to OM pathogenesis. It is currently unclear whether compromised host immune system responses have a significant role in RAOM/COME. Bacterial biofilms within the ME may contribute to otopathogen persistence and recurrent infection and/or inflammation in these children. Aims This study identified the predominant bacterial and viral otopathogens within the URT and ME, of children undergoing ventilation tube insertion (VTI) for RAOM/COME. Bacterial persistence within the ME, in the form of biofilms was also examined. Bacteria and viruses which were identified within the URT of children with RAOM/COME were compared to a control group of children who were undergoing adenoidectomy for treatment of adenoidal hypertrophy (AH) and/or obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA). Local (saliva, middle ear effusion (MEE)) and systemic (serum) innate and adaptive immune responses were examined in children with and without RAOM/COME. Specific antibody levels to bacterial proteins as well as cytokine levels were determined. Systemic immuno-gene expression was compared between children with RAOM/COME and AH/OSA.