How do women face the emergency after a catastrophic event? A PRISMA 2020 systematic review

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-1525611/v1

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How do women face the emergency after a catastrophic event? A PRISMA 2020 systematic review

https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-1525611/v1

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Aim

To conduct a systematic analysis of scientific articles from a social sciences perspective that focus on the role of women as active subjects during an emergency, particularly, in terms of evacuation actions in the aftermath of disasters of natural origin.

Method

A literature review following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA 2020) guidelines. The databases used were Web of Science and SCOPUS.

Findings

: This systematic review comprises the 25 articles which met our selection criteria out of the 63,852 studies initially found in the search. Although the progressive incorporation of a gender perspective can be seen in the academic study of disasters within the field of social sciences, the scientific production, especially with reference to the emergency phase, remains scant. The current literature reveals the importance of taking into account the knowledge women have, as well as how they behave following a catastrophe.

Conclusions

The results of the analysis carried out demonstrate that in making visible how gender roles operate during the early response period in an emergency, especially in relation to the role played by women as active subjects, the traditional notion of rescue is extended. On the basis of this analysis recommendations are made which can facilitate an approach to disaster risk management that guarantees gender equality in an emergency.

Disasters of natural origin impact the populations where they occur in ways that go far beyond physical damage and/or damage to infrastructures: they disrupt the social order and human relations. However, a look at the literature on catastrophe phenomena reveals the preponderance of studies that are technical rather than social in nature (Enarson 1998). Even today, therefore, much research considers that events such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, floods, hurricanes and pandemics affect all members of the population equally and does not approach such phenomena and their impact from a gender perspective. In the 1980s, pioneering studies, such as those of Rivers (1982) and Dufka (1988), highlighted the fact that poverty affects women to a greater extent than men, making it more difficult for them to recover after a catastrophic event.

That said, it was not until the following decade that research began to incorporate a gender perspective in the analysis of disasters (Anderson 1994; Enarson and Morrow 1998; Fothergill 1998). Since then, substantial advances have been made that point to the greater vulnerability of women, which is reflected in their higher levels of mortality in certain catastrophes and the worse effect they have on women’s health (Oxfam International 2005; Akerkar 2007; Bradshaw and Fordham 2013). The data also indicate that following a catastrophe there is an increase in violence against women (Enarson 1999; Fisher 2010; Seager 2014), as well as a widening of economic inequality (Wiest et al. 1995; Bradshaw and Fordham 2013; Llorente-Marrón et al. 2020a) and a rise in women’s social vulnerability (Llorente-Marrón et al. 2020b). Specifically, research suggests that in dealing with a catastrophe situation, pre-existing gender inequalities are evident in all dimensions and phases of the catastrophe.

The most recent works focus on not only the impact of the catastrophe on gender relations, but also on the active role that women can play in such a context, thus widening the scope of the study from women’s vulnerability to considering the capacities they deploy in confronting a disaster (Paton and Johnston 2017; Yumarni and Amaratunga 2018). In addition, intersectional analyses have been carried out which have revealed the relationship between gender and other variables (McKinzie 2017). Other works have demonstrated the differential experience and specific needs of men and women in a disaster context depending on their age (Brolles et al. 2017; Baytiyeh 2019; Kawachi et al. 2020) or whether they have any functional diversity (Phibbs et al. 2014). There are also studies which show how gender intersects with ethnicity, particularly in populations where there is greater ethnic/racial diversity (Gaillard et al.2015; Gotham and Cheek 2017). Other recent areas of interest in the literature are masculinities (Enarson and Pease 2016; Olivius 2016) and sexual diversity (Gaillard et al.2017; Rushton et al.2019), which has led to the adoption of wider and more inclusive notions of gender than the gender binary used until recently in the analysis of disasters.

The immediate aftermath of a catastrophe is a particularly suitable scenario in which to observe the behaviour of the population since there are a huge range of immediate decisions that need to be taken in order to prioritise actions, coordinate efforts, help in the search for people, keep them alive or reduce their suffering and take care of survivors, among many other issues. Many of these tasks are not unfamiliar to women as they form part of the reproductive work that they undertake on a daily basis. However, the scientific production has principally focused on the protagonist role of men during the rescue of people and/or goods (Tyler and Fairbrother 2013; Enarson and Pease 2016; Rushton et al. 2021). Male actions, both those relating to the family and the wider community as well as those undertaken under the auspices of organisations involved in the emergency, which are often highly masculinised -such as the military, the civile protection services and firefighters- are extremely visible. In the social imaginary, men figure as the principal protagonists in rescue actions, something which is reinforced by the treatment they receive in the media (Cox et al. 2008; Quigley and Quigley 2013; Zarqa 2014). It is for this reason that the current article aims to systematically analyse the scientific literature which focuses on the active role played by women during an emergency. Demonstrating women’s capacity for agency is not only important in scientific terms as it also has serious practical implications. Based on our findings we also propose directions for future research efforts and recommendations which can be incorporated in disaster risk management policies with the aim of improving their impact in terms of gender.

Information sources and inclusion criteria

The methodology employed for the literature review in the present work was designed following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA 2020) protocol. The data bases selected for the literature search were Web of Science (WoS) and SCOPUS. The criteria to include articles in the analysis were based on our proposed aim. As such, we considered those from the field of the social sciences which analysed the role of women as active subjects during an emergency and, specifically, in undertaking rescue and evacuation actions following a disaster of natural origin.

Search strategy and selection process

The search terms employed in both databases for the literature search were: ("Disaster*" OR "Natural disaster*" OR "Hazard*" OR "Natural hazard*" OR "Catastrophe*" OR "Natural calamit*" OR "Fatalit*") AND ("Rescue*" OR "Evacuation procedure*" OR "response" OR "Salvage" OR "early response" OR "emergency") AND ("Gender" OR "Women" OR "Female" OR "feminine" OR "sex").

The search was first carried out in the WoS database, limiting it to the “Web of Science Core Collection”, which yielded an initial 7,553 documents. A first automatic filtering of the results was conducted by excluding the terms: ("nutrient*" OR "addiction*" OR "consumption" OR "disorder*" OR "patient*" OR "DNA" OR "rat*" OR "refugee*" OR "mice" OR "menstrual" OR "sexual" OR "protein" OR "model" OR "covid" OR "antibiotic*" OR "stress" OR "pregnan*" OR "postpartum" OR "perinatal" OR "sport*" OR "war*" OR "political conflict*" OR "protest*" OR "terrorism"), because of their high incidence in the results but their low relevance and relationship with the study’s aim. In this way the sample was reduced to 502 documents, of which 461 scientific articles were automatically selected, thereby excluding book chapters and reviews, among others. Next, the search was circumscribed to 24 knowledge areas and the articles were grouped as follows: Environmental Sciences (37), Environmental Studies (30); Social Sciences Interdisciplinary (22); Geography (11); Social Work (11); Multidisciplinary Sciences (10); Sociology (10); Public Administration (7); Multidisciplinary Psychology (7); Psychology (6); Social Issues (6); Women Studies (5); Development Studies (5); Anthropology (4); Communication (4); Family Studies (4); Psychology Social (4); Regional Urban Planning (4), Education Educational Research (3); Psychology Applied (3); Psychology Developmental (3); Behavioural Sciences (1); Religion (1); Urban Studies (1). Due to their simultaneous presence in more than one area of knowledge, 33 articles were excluded and the final selection was therefore 166 articles.

In the SCOPUS database, the search was limited to the principal collection, which produced an initial selection of 56,299 documents. For the automatic filtering step, the same exclusion terms were used as for WoS, which reduced the sample to 3,338 documents. From these, 2,753 scientific articles were automatically selected, thus excluding, as in WoS, any document that was not a scientific article. Next, the search was circumscribed to four areas of knowledge: Social Sciences (457) Environmental Sciences (337); Psychology (127); Multidisciplinary (45); Decision Sciences (6); Undefined (3), and this reduced the articles selected to 870 after 105 were excluded because they appeared in more than one knowledge area.

It is important to highlight that knowledge areas are not organised in the same way in WoS and in SCOPUS. However, for this review, all studies from the knowledge areas and fields of study related to social sciences in both databases were selected, as well as those which were multidisciplinary in nature.

Screening

The title, abstract and keywords of 166 articles from WoS and 870 from SCOPUS were examined and we excluded those which: a) did not incorporate a gender perspective; b) were focused exclusively on women’s vulnerability and not on their active role; c) only addressed the role of men in rescue actions; d) were not focused on populations affected by a disaster of natural origin; e) analysed natural origin disasters which developed over time rather than being ‘sudden’; f) studied the reconstruction phase in the medium and long term; g) had a geo-technical focus only; h) investigated armed conflicts; i) investigated pandemics and epidemics; and j) were not based on empirical research.

These exclusion criteria reduced the articles selected to 37 articles from WoS and 69 from SCOPUS. These 106 articles were then reviewed in-depth one by one, resulting in a final selection of 7 articles from WoS, 13 from SCOPUS and 5 which appeared in both databases. The final number of articles that were included in the systematic review was 25, the duplicated articles only being counted once and attributed to the WoS database. The number of articles rejected in each stage of the exclusion process explained above is shown in Fig. 1.

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Data extraction

The articles in this literature review were organised into categories using a data extraction template. Firstly, the methodology used in each article was systematised, including the aims, the methodological approach used and data collection techniques, along with information about the study sample if it was specified (Table 1). Secondly, general information was extracted about the findings of each article as well as their main contributions and any limitations (Table 2). The data were tabulated and narratively synthesised (PRISMA Results Report).

Table 1
Methodological characteristics of the articles examined
Authors (year)	Study aim	Type of disaster/year	Area/Country	Study design	Techniques	Population selected and sample size
Bradshaw (2001)	Focusing on women’s participation in emergency, individual household responses and their leadership in reconstruction projects	Hurricane Mitch (1998)	Nicaragua	Mixed methods	Census, semi-structured interviews, focus groups	N/A
Bateman and Edwards (2002)	Investigating disaster response, specifically how women and men evacuate their homes as hurricanes approach	Hurricane Bonnie (1998)	United States (North Carolina)	Quantitative	Secondary sources (analysis based in data from previous survey)	1,029 household respondents (62% women and 38% men; 83% white population and 17% non-white)
Cupples (2007)	Examining women’s roles and relations to consider how participants’ involvement in the disaster process impacts on their subjectivities and their gender identities	Hurricane Mitch (1998)	Nicaragua (urban communities of El Mirador, El Tambor and Barrio Richardson and in the rural communities of Apantillo Siares and El Hatillo)	Qualitative	In-depth semi-structured interviews	12 participants (only women)
Hamilton and Halvorson (2007)	Making recommendations for the significant challenges and concerns facing women earthquake survivors	Earthquake (2005)	Pakistan (Kashmir)	Qualitative	N/A	N/A
Alam and Collins (2010)	Exploring the context of vulnerability and local coping strategies in relation to cyclone response experiences	Cyclones (1970, 1985, 1991, 1997, 1998 and 2007)	Bangladesh (Coastal areas of Chakoria, Kutubdia Island, Sandwip, Bay of Bengal, Urir Char)	Mixed methods	Life experiences, participant observations, semi-structured and open-ended interviews, surveys (on-site, non-probability sampling), focus groups	1 man life experience, 120 household heads interviewed (108 men, 12 women), 8 focus groups (6 of men, 2 of women)
Dhungel and Ojha (2012)	Analysing the activities of Women’s Empowerment Centres (WEC) developed as part of Disaster Risk Reduction and Humanitarian programme (DRR-HP)	Various floods (No specific date)	Nepal (southern areas)	Qualitative	Review of partners’ reports, focus groups	37 reviews and focus groups (all of them women)
Silver and Andrey (2014)	Understanding the factors that influence individuals’ behaviours, focusing on previous disaster experience and demographics	Tornado (2011)	Canada (Goderich, Ontario)	Mixed methods	Semi-structured interviews, surveys (online and on-site, non-probability sampling)	35 semi-structured interviews and 304 survey respondents; not disaggregated by sex
Whittaker et al. (2016)	Examining the gendered dimensions of risk awareness, preparedness and response among households affected by the bushfires	“Black Saturday” fires (2009)	Australia (Victoria)	Mixed methods	Semi-structured interviews, survey (online, non-probability sampling)	600 in-depth interviews; 1,314 household survey respondents; not disaggregated by sex
Reyes and Lu (2017)	Studying the Philippine disaster management system, to investigate the role of institutions in the vulnerability of women to local disasters	Various floods (No specific date)	Philippine (Metro Manila, City of Malabon, Barangay Catmon)	Mixed methods	Interviews, survey (on-site)	6 interviews and 68 survey respondents (all of them women)
Soetanto et al. (2017)	Exploring perceptions of SR (social responsibility) and demographic factors in relation to flooding for householders and local businesses	Various floods (No specific date)	United Kingdom (Birmingham, South East London)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site, non-probability sampling)	414 respondents (58% men, 42% women)
Rohli et al. (2018)	Evaluating the responses exhibit by college students and their feelings when threatened by the presence of hurricanes	Hurricane Isaac (2012)	United States (Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site, non-probability sampling)	107 respondents (55% women, 45% men)
Tyler and Fairbrother (2018)	Examining gender differences in the preference for early evacuation in a wildfire context	“Black Saturday” fires (2009)	Australia (New South Wales, Victoria, and Western Australia)	Qualitative	Interviews	107 interviews to 116 participants (54 women, 62 men, some of them in pairs)
Cvetković et al. (2018)	Investigating the risk perceptions and preparedness of women and men regarding catastrophic events	Various hazards (2014)	Serbia (Kraljevo, Šabac, Novi Sad, Secanj Obrenovac, Priboj, Kragujevac, Bašta, Smederevska Bajina Palanka, Užice, Smederevo, Loznica, Rekovac, Kruševac, Paracin, Batocina, Lapovo, Svilajnac, Sremska Mitrovica)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site)	2,500 respondents (50.2% women, 49.8% men)
Augustine et al. (2019)	Analysing the level of disaster preparedness and response among households’ members	N/A	Afghanistan (30 villages in three Badakhshan districts: Yawan, Kohistan, and Raghistan)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site)	314 respondents (158 men, 156 women)
Hou and Wu (2020)	Studying women’s leadership at different stages of their lifespans after an earthquake situation	Earthquake (2008)	China (Wenchuan County, Mao County, City of Dujiangyan, City of Shifang, city of Mianzhu, and Beichuan County)	Qualitative	Focus groups, walk-along interviews	18 focus groups (119 women); 72 walk-along interviews (72 women)
Oliveira et al. (2020)	Obtaining exploratory data and analysing trends on relevant factors shaping an individual’s hazard response	Wildfires (2016–2017)	Portugal (Algeriz and Pedrogao Grande)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site and online, non-probability sampling)	282 respondents; mainly women
Walker et al. (2020)	Proposing intersectionality as a framework approach in analysing wildfires	Wildfires (2017)	Canada (La Ronge tri-community, Saskatchewan)	Qualitative	Semi-structured interviews	34 semi-structured interviews (13 men, 21 women)
Wei et al. (2020)	Evaluating the cognition and response of middle/high school students to earthquakes and provide suggestions on education strategies for disaster prevention and reduction	N/A	China (Ya’an city, Sichuan Basin)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site)	1,164 respondents (39.3% men; 56% women; 4.7% missing)
De Silva (2021)	Evaluating TEW (tsunami early warning) programme and developing digital gender equity strategies in TEW systems	Various tsunamis (No specific date)	Sri Lanka (Galle, Batticaloa, and Hambantota)	Qualitative	Semi-structured interviews	38 interviews; not disaggregated by sex
Jayasekara et al. (2021)	Analysing the gaps in existing EW (early warnings) and EP (early preparedness) related to tsunami and other coastal hazards	Various tsunamis (No specific date)	Sri Lanka	Quantitative	Survey (online, non-probability sampling)	408 respondents (352 fully completed); not disaggregated by sex
Kang et al. (2021)	Examining post-disaster response activities of females in earthquake situation	Earthquake (2017)	South Korea (Pohang, “Pohang Mom Café” online community)	Mixed methods	Focus group interview, individual in-depth interviews and semantic network analysis	1 focus group interview (5 members); 4 individual in-depth interviews; 1,326 posts used for network analysis
Khan et al. (2021)	Exploring gender-based emergency preparedness at the high school level in a multi-hazard environment	Various earthquakes (No specific date)	Pakistan (Gilgit city)	Quantitative	Survey (on-site)	486 respondents, 248 men, 238 women
Lachlan et al. (2021)	Examining cognition and ruminative coping tendencies, as potential mechanisms driving the observed sex differences in information seeking	Hurricane Dorian (2019)	United States (Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia)	Quantitative	Survey (Not specified whether it was online, face-to-face or by telephone; non-probability sampling)	1,152 respondents; not disaggregated by sex
Oktari et al. (2021)	Examining the integration of the gender perspective in a disaster-resilient village programme	Various hazards (No specific date)	Indonesia (Aceh Besar District, Aceh Province)	Mixed methods	Observation, interviews, survey (on-site)	179 participants (95 women and 84 men)
Dema Moreno et al. (2022)	Analysing the gender roles of men and women in the phase of rescuing people	Earthquake (2011)	Spain (Lorca, Murcia)	Qualitative	Focus groups	2 focus group (15 women) and 2 focus groups (13 men)
Source: Produced by the authors on the basis of data from the systematic review

Table 2

Main contributions of the articles examined
Authors (year)	Main results	Main conclusions	Limitations
Bradshaw (2001)	Men and women worked together to evacuate people but, women’s actions were not made visible or were not valued as they are related to care and securing basic needs. When women undertake masculinised work, their labours acquire value and visibility, although they are usually considered to consist in ‘helping’ men in their activities.	The majority of men recognised women’s work during the emergency, although principally when this work was outside traditional women activities performed by women.	No information provided about sample size, or the methodology employed.
Bateman and Edwards (2002)	Females were more likely than males to evacuate from their homes because of Hurricane Bonnie. Bivariate and multivariate results support the argument that sex differences in evacuation were not caused by inherent or ‘natural’ differences between the sexes. Rather, women are more likely to evacuate than men because of socially constructed gender differences with respect to other factors that influence the intention and capacity to evacuate.	Women are more likely to evacuate because of hurricanes due to underlying gender differences in caregiving roles, evacuation preparation, their greater exposure to certain objective risks, and their more acute perception of subjective risk.	There is not a clear differentiation between the decision to evacuate and the structural restrictions that limit a person’s capacity to do so.
Cupples (2007)	It is not possible to say that women will behave or respond to a disaster in a particular way. Even women with similar background characteristics will not react to the same event in the same manner.	Disasters provide a favourable context for the renegotiation of gender roles and produce personal and social transformations.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Hamilton and Halvorson (2007)	Women played a critical role in spontaneous and organised relief efforts, digging out survivors, feeding those in need and building and maintaining temporary shelters.	Women became a fundamental force in the struggle for survival, and as first responders caring for the injured and the dying. The highly patriarchal social structure and purdah made it extremely difficult for women to evacuate mountain villages and to access aid materials, healthcare and compensation for their losses.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Alam and Collins (2010)	Most affected households only left their homes when they saw water coming close. The decision to save belongings and to leave home in most cases rested with the male head of the household. Due to conservative religious beliefs, many of the male heads of households preferred not to move to cyclone shelters, thinking that the female members of the household might break their purdah.	The findings highlight three underlying vulnerabilities to cyclone disasters: hazard risk perceptions; pre-cyclone decisions whether to go to cyclone shelters; and inadequate land management policies in the coastal areas of the country.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Dhungel and Ojha (2012)	Women in the communities where WEC (Women Empowerment Centres) are active perform multiple roles for disaster risk management at the household and the community level.	WEC are effective in building resilient communities as they ensure better disaster preparedness at the household and the community level. This type of Project facilitates the empowerment of the most vulnerable groups, particularly, women.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Silver and Andrey (2014)	In most cases protective action is not statistically associated with individual sociodemographic variables. Although, females are more likely than males to take protective actions.	Previous recent experience of a disaster influences the protective actions taken by the population. Gender itself is a factor that affects the decision making involved in carrying out these protective actions.	The sample is not disaggregated by sex, and as such it is not possible to know to what extent the results are representative.
Whittaker et al. (2016)	Differences in women’s and men’s perceptions of risk were identified and affected their responses when a disaster occurred. Women more often wanted to leave their homes than men.	Bushfires are gendered experiences in that they are influenced by the roles played by men and women in society. Knowledge of how men and women behave in bushfire scenarios allows community safety initiatives to be designed that are tailored to the particular needs of women and men.	The sample is not disaggregated by sex, and as such it is not possible to know to what extent the results are representative.
Reyes and Lu (2017)	More than two-thirds of the population consider the assistance of the government to be necessary during disasters, and they also perceive that the government is readily accessible. In terms of disaster preparation, more than nine out of ten respondents expressed familiarity with national policies concerning disasters and they also understand that the local government is prepared for such situations.	The study underscored the importance of gender mainstreaming in disaster management due to the increased vulnerability of women in such contexts, as well as the fact that it is women who take on the brunt of caring for the household during and after disasters. The study also showed the short-term responses of institutions to disasters, particularly local government, in terms of the provision of trainings for emergency responses and aids.	The confidence level of the survey is low (90% for the sample selected).
Soetanto et al. (2017)	The model used to measure social responsibility (SR) indicates that experience of flooding is the most important variable, behind age of respondent and ethnicity, on the perception of social responsibility when a disaster occurs. Gender does not seem to be a significant variable and does not increase the explanatory power of the model proposed in the study.	Experience, age and ethnicity should be taken into account when attempting to understand motivating factors for engagement with policies and agendas.	The finding of this research is limited by its non-probabilistic sampling of the respondents and unequal sample representation, especially in terms of ethnic groups and age. In addition, responses from flooded communities may not necessarily be from individuals whose homes or businesses were flooded.
Cvetković et al. (2018)	The most important predictor of individual preparedness is gender. Men reported providing more assistance to catastrophe victims, as well as economic support for their families. Women have more proactive attitudes about effective assistance at reception centres compared to men.	Although there were some variables that indicated no significant, or only slight, differences between men and women, larger magnitude and significant differences appeared to revolve around men’s perceptions of being more prepared and being more active or willing to be involved in or led by community-level activities. Women generally reported being less confident and also more concerned on household and family-level cares.	No limitations are indicated.
Rohli et al. (2018)	A direct relationship was found between hurricane knowledge and preparedness, and preparation anxiety was significantly and inversely related to preparedness.	The positive association between hurricane knowledge and experience shows that experience is the most important variable when a disaster has to be confronted. Knowledge and experience are negatively correlated with preparation anxiety.	The results of this study are limited to one single university.
Tyler and Fairbrother (2018)	Gendered expectations, particularly regarding dominant constructions of masculinity, could inhibit open discussion and negotiation between members of a heterosexual couple about the best course of action to take during a bushfire. There are competing expectations for men and women (the latter being more likely to feel comfortable about leaving earlier, or feel responsible for the evacuation of others, especially children), which could make reaching agreement difficult.	The social construction of gender needs to be better understood as a factor influencing what course of action may appeal to residents and how they determine, or attempt to determine, an agreed course of action within a household.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Augustine et al. (2019)	Female heads of households, engaged in agriculture or related employment, with low monthly income, with low disaster-preparedness knowledge, and with prior disaster experience were more likely to take low preparedness measures when a disaster strikes.	The findings reveal that less economic security, lower knowledge of emergencies and emergency plans, being a female head of household, and having prior disaster experience tended to predict lower levels of preparedness among individuals. Disaster-preparedness interventions targeted at improving the knowledge of hazards and hazard plans, as well as enhancing the livelihood and income security of affected households, could minimise the negative impact of disasters.	The study does not clearly show how the main sociodemographic variables studied affect the way in which people deal with the emergency situation that they face.
Hou and Wu (2020)	Women’s local leadership capacity had grown beyond the traditional care-giving role and more importantly, extended to the decision-making process, contributing to the advancement of resiliency at the individual, family, and community levels.	Women’s capacity for managing and negotiating, shown in their leadership after the catastrophe, directly advances resilience at the individual, family, and community level. Their leadership capacity also demonstrates the powerful contributions towards disaster risk reduction that women can make in the post-disaster period.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Oliveira et al. (2020)	Depending on their age, gender, educational level and professional activity, people had different perceptions and made different choices. This should be further investigated, and the findings integrated in communication and training actions so as to increase their efficiency.	Although sociodemographic characteristics influence a population’s knowledge of fire risk, a general problem is identified in all social strata: the disconnection between policies and citizens’ needs. To overcome this, it is recommended that decision makers should design efficient measures adjusted to the needs of each specific group in the population.	Taking into account that the sample analysed is not representative of the whole of the country, the questionnaire should be extended to other areas and the results being compared.
Walker et al. (2020)	Gendered norms influence residents’ responses to fire. Elders, pregnant women and those with existing health concerns were among the first to leave their homes, following the voluntary evacuation announcements.	Location, race, ethnicity, gender and age intersected in complex ways, resulting in diverse experiences of impacts and losses, such as physical health and safety, mental and emotional well-being, sense of place, and self-determination and influence.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Wei et al. (2020)	Significant differences in earthquake disaster knowledge and response capability among different sociodemographic groups was found. Differences in earthquake knowledge and emotion regulation are statistically significant between male and female students. Differences in prevention skills between male and female students are not significant.	Even having the same educational background, female students might be more vulnerable to disasters and their impacts than male students. More attention should be paid to female students in terms of training, information and access to information in schools.	Does not clearly show the ways in which the catastrophe preparedness of the population is put into practice at the point when a catastrophe actually occurs.
De Silva (2021)	TEW (tsunami early warning) practises and strategies are affected by women's and men’s socially assigned roles and responsibilities.	The study indicates the need to develop strategies and practices that are gender sensitive and allow women to participate in TEW system.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Jayasekara et al. (2021)	The low use of social media for communicating disaster-related information depends mainly on people’s age. Gender does not appear to be a significant factor.	Numerous communication problems in catastrophe situations are identified which affect both the community itself and its relations with the authorities. On the basis of these ‘gaps’, more than 40 recommendations are made and the need to create an easily accessible online platform in order to improve communication during a disaster.	The data is not disaggregated by sex.
Kang et al. (2021)	Mothers faced a series of transformation processes in post-disaster, from fear and helplessness to a sense of duty to protect their children. They also deploy active collective responses.	The active role of women in disaster situations is comprehensive, and their notion of responsibility makes them stronger. Digital activities and communication facilitate their collective action and the protection of their families from the emergency and from future risks. All of this increases women’s capacity to influence community politics.	This study focuses on the active role of mothers and cannot be extrapolated to other women. Due to its qualitative nature, its results are not generalisable.
Khan et al. (2021)	The analysis revealed a clear difference in emergency preparedness and its components in that the boy students seemed relatively better prepared for emergencies than the girl students.	Emergency preparedness is needed in schools to protect the lives of students. This will not only save lives but will also empower the overall ability of communities to deal with the natural hazards. The gender differences were particularly significant in terms of crisis communication, and the support and assistance component of emergency preparedness. The study indicates that information campaigns should be run in schools to improve emergency preparedness.	The robustness indicators and index need to be tested in other schools for validation purposes. In addition, more research is needed to observe gender differences in the contexts of urban and rural schools; public and private schools; and also consider gender differences between teachers, students, and principals.
Lachlan et al. (2021)	Differences between men and women were detected in information seeking and rumination tendency. At low levels of need for cognition and high levels of rumination, men and women were almost identical in level of information seeking. Information seeking did not differ significantly across those who had or had not physically lost their home.	Women reported higher levels of information seeking, consistent with recent research in crisis and risk communication. Women, regardless of level of rumination tendencies, appear to exhibit high levels of information seeking behaviour. Men with high levels of rumination tendencies are much more similar to women at all levels of rumination in comparison to men with low or middle levels of rumination.	The sample is not disaggregated by sex, and as such it is not possible to know to what extent the results are representative.
Oktari et al. (2021)	Only a small number of women have planned, for themselves and for their family, some form of earthquake and tsunami preparedness. Most of the female respondents are still in the low and medium levels of preparedness. More than 80% of women preferred to be saved by their relatives.	The analysis carried out confirms the importance of integrating gender as a cross-disciplinary element in village disaster resilience programmes. The study also suggests taking affirmative actions in order to create a better sense of equality that would boost women’s negotiating power and enable their voices to be heard.	The results refer to a specific programme.
Dema Moreno et al. (2022)	At the time of a catastrophe, men and women undertake a series of immediate actions that are in line with traditional gender roles.	Women’s rescue actions are not as visible as men’s, which act as the hegemonic model. Women’s interventions are not limited to physical rescue but also include verbal suggestions and recommendations linked to their traditional caring roles.	The qualitative results are not generalisable.
Source: Produced by the authors on the basis of data from the systematic review

Study risk of bias assessment

In order to try and minimise potential bias, the full process of designing the present study, as well as the search and selection of articles for analysis, was undertaken collectively, systematically and exhaustively. In terms of the design, the four authors, all experts in gender and disasters, together established the aim of the analysis and the parameters for the search for articles. In addition, a work protocol was set up that consisted in replicating the search at two different times. Firstly, one of the researchers made an initial selection, both automatic and manual, on their own. The results were discussed among all the researchers, and two months later they were all involved in repeating the search to validate the process. The results of the second search were the same as those of the first, with the exception of one article that had not appeared before because it had only recently been published in WoS, but it was included due to its relevance. Furthermore, the research team were able to access the complete text of all the published works selected, which facilitates in-depth analysis and substantially reduces the bias that may have resulted if this had not been the case.

The two databases used for the PRISMA review, WoS and SCOPUS, bring together the scientific production with the greatest impact on the planet as a whole. However, we are aware that the knowledge collated in these databases is not neutral. On the one hand, most of the works published in these databases are in the form of articles and, to a lesser extent, books and other types of publications that are more common in the social sciences and the humanities. On the other, they are mainly written in English, which results in the overrepresentation of realities as perceived by the English-speaking world. Finally, gender issues are not dominant in scientific journals, nor in social sciences ones, and even less so in those related with disasters.

In this section we provide the principal results of the systematic review of the selected articles. These results show the methodological perspectives used to study the active role of women during an emergency resulting from a disaster of natural origin, specifically during evacuation and rescue. They also show the themes that have been studied, along with the main results obtained and conclusions reached.

The use of methods

The articles selected for analysis were heterogenous in terms of the methodologies they employed (see table 1). While there is no clear predominant approach, there are more works of a quantitative character (Bateman and Edwards 2002; Soetanto et al. 2017; Cvetković et al. 2018; Rohli et al. 2018; Augustine et al. 2019; Oliveira et al. 2020; Wei et al. 2020; Jayasekara et al. 2021; Khan et al. 2021; Lachlan et al. 2021) compared with those taking a qualitative approach (Cupples 2007; Hamilton and Halvorson 2007; Dhungel and Ojha 2012; Tyler and Fairbrother 2018; Hou and Wu 2020; Walker et al. 2020; De Silva 2021; Dema Moreno et al. 2022) or employing a mixed methodology (Bradshaw 2001; Alam and Collins 2010; Silver and Andrey 2014; Whittaker et al. 2016; Reyes and Lu 2017; Kang et al. 2021; Oktari et al. 2021).

With respect to the data collection techniques used, the first thing of note is that studies of a quantitative and mixed methodology nature generally use non-probability sampling (Bradshaw 2001; Bateman and Edwards 2002; Alam and Collins 2010; Silver and Andrey 2014; Whittaker et al. 2016; Soetanto et al. 2017; Rohli et al. 2018; Jayasekara et al. 2021; Lachlan et al. 2021; Oliveira et al. 2020). Furthermore, questionnaires were principally completed on-site, apart from two cases, where they were online (Whittaker et al. 2016; Jayasekara et al. 2021) and two cases they were both online and on-site (Silver and Andrey 2014; Oliveira et al. 2020), while one study conducted the questionnaire by phone (Bateman and Edwards 2002) and in two case the data collection method was not specified (Bradshaw 2001; Lachlan et al. 2021). Details of how sample selection was made are scant in the majority of the studies. Only six of the studies have a probabilistic sample and have a sufficiently large sample size to make them statistically representative of the population as a whole (Reyes and Lu 2017; Cvetković et al. 2018; Augustine et al. 2019; Wei et al. 2020; Khan et al. 2021; Oktari et al. 2021). In addition, four of the studies do not provide information about the composition of the sample in terms of sex/gender, despite them analysing the variable of gender (Silver and Andrey 2014; Whittaker et al. 2016; Jayasekara et al. 2021; Lachlan et al. 2021). For this reason, although ten of the studies analysed in the systematic review are quantitative in nature, only half of them meet the necessary criteria to be considered representative.

Those studies using a qualitative or mixed methodology, obtained information principally through the use of in-depth interviews or focus groups (Bradshaw 2001; Cupples 2007; Alam and Collins 2010; Dhungel and Ojha 2012; Silver and Andrey 2014; Whittaker et al. 2016; Reyes and Lu 2017; Tyler and Fairbrother 2018; Hou and Wu 2020; Walker et al. 2020; De Silva 2021; Khan et al. 2021; Oktari et al. 2021; Dema Moreno et al. 2022). Only a few of the articles employ other techniques, such as observation (Oktari et al. 2021; Alam and Collins 2010). Three of the articles analysed used techniques which are not commonly used: Alam and Collins (2010) is based on the lived experience of the first of the authors in cyclones in Bangladesh; Dhungel and Ojha (2012) review the information contained in reports from Women’s Empowerment Centres in Nepal; and Hamilton and Halvorson (2007) collected testimonies, although the technique is not specified, of women who lived through the earthquake in Pakistan in 2005. These qualitative works, although they are not in themselves generalisable, provide localised information that is useful to find out about women’s experiences in an emergency, particularly during the evacuation and rescue of people.

The low representativeness of the quantitative studies, together with the lack of generalisability of the qualitative studies, makes it difficult, firstly, to obtain information that is comparable between geographical areas and populations. Secondly, the paucity of published work about women’s active role in emergency contexts in regions such as Latin America and the absence of scientific production on this issue with respect to the continent of Africa limits our knowledge at the global scale.

Thematic areas

One of the most important themes in scientific literature is the difference in the way men and women perceive and deal with risk in disasters, an issue closely linked to the gender mandates that are present in different cultural contexts (see table 2).

Authors such as Bateman and Edwards (2002) and Cvetković et al. (2018) consider that women have a heightened perception of subjective risk than men, who appeared to be more confident about managing an emergency situation, which also affects the way they approach and make the decision to evacuate their homes when a catastrophe phenomenon occurs. These differences in criteria are reflected in the decision making which is activated in disaster situations, particularly when people from the same household do not necessarily behave in the same way. In traditional families, some researchers have reported that women wait at home until the arrival of their husbands, who, in their role as head of the family, have the final say with respect to initiating the evacuation process and when it happens (Alam and Collins 2010). Other research has shown that couples negotiate, either in person or by phone, to reach an agreement about evacuating (Kang et al. 2021). However, on occasion, consensus is not possible because of differences in the criteria for evacuation of each person in the couple, related to the fact that women prefer to evacuate early while men are more likely to remain in the danger zone for longer (Bateman and Edwards 2002; Whittaker et al. 2016; Tyler and Fairbrother 2018; Walker et al. 2020). A pattern observed in Australia with respect to wildfires is that women and children are the first to leave their homes, with men staying in the family home, whether to protect it from the disaster or to rescue belongings necessary for survival (Tyler and Fairbrother 2018). However, there are also occasions where women are more reticent to abandon the home, because they consider that they are more protected there or because they are the ones responsible for gathering together the essential goods necessary for dealing with the immediate aftermath of the catastrophe (Alam and Collins 2010; Kang et al. 2021; Dema Moreno et al. 2022).

The fact that there is this difference between men and women in terms of how long they consider it appropriate to stay in their homes is not down to biology, but rather to the gender roles that men and women assume within the family (Bateman and Edwards 2002). The principal reason behind women’s protectionist actions is the caring role that they traditionally undertake, especially when they have responsibility for children or people with dependency needs (Bateman and Edwards 2002; Alam and Collins 2010; Silver and Andrey 2014; Tyler and Fairbrother 2018). Women are more likely to make decisions that better protect those in their care, even putting the safety of their charges before their own lives. In fact, a number of the articles analysed demonstrate that women are disproportionately exposed to risk, which hampers their survival since sometimes they are not able to leave their homes, or wherever they find themselves, quickly and on other occasions they return to rescue other people (Cupples 2007; Alam and Collins 2010; Kang et al. 2021).

Nevertheless, what the literature shows us is that women participate in the task of rescuing and evacuating the people for whom they are responsible to the same extent as men do (Bradshaw 2001). However, it is common that the actions of women often go unnoticed or are not considered to be important because they are associated with the female care role. When they undertake tasks that are typically masculinised, such as moving rubble, women’s work receives greater social acknowledgement, although even in such scenarios women’s work is often considered a mere support or complement to the work of men.

Another of the recurring themes in the articles is the importance of taking into account other factors, such as previous experience, when confronted with evacuation (Soetanto et al. 2017; Rolhi et al. 2018) or the intersection of gender and other social dimensions that are important in an emergency situation, such as social class, age ethnicity and/or religion (Bateman and Edwards 2002; Hamilton and Halvorson 2007; Kang et al. 2021; Jayasekara et al. 2021). One example of how this manifests is in terms of young people’s access to information. Since evacuation does not only occur from the home, but also in other contexts such as schools, some studies have evidenced differences in knowledge of evacuation procedures between male and female students, with female students usually having less information (Khan et al. 2020; Wei et al. 2020). Despite this knowledge gap putting female students in a more vulnerable situation, it has been demonstrated that, as happens within the home, young women and girls take on an active role in the rescue of and caring for younger schoolmates (Hou and Wu 2020).

Some of the articles about preparation against a disaster and early warning systems reinforce this idea, showing that women do not access the information necessary for decision making in an emergency to the same extent as men (Augustine et al. 2019; Oliveira et al. 2020; De Silva 2021). Works such as that of Cvetković et al. (2018) suggest that the channels through which men and women get information are also different. Women say they receive or access information mainly through technological sources and through the family, since they have fewer opportunities to maintain a high level of social networking in the community, which may lead to them being less informed. Their male counterparts reported relying more on neighbours, friends, and coworkers. The Internet, through social networks, however, can facilitate women’s participation and collective organisation.

The review also highlighted the importance of incorporating a gender perspective in the implementation of prevention and emergency management programmes in order to make disaster preparedness and relief more effective. In this sense, some works indicate that, compared to men, women more frequently carry out information searches in relation to the disaster threatening them (Lachlan et al. 2021). For this reason, measures have been adopted to promote women’s access to information and training with the aim of them acquiring the knowledge necessary to deal with catastrophe situations (Reyes and Lu 2017; Wei et al. 2020; Khan et al. 2021; Oktari et al. 2021). Other researchers, such as De Silva (2021), have gone further and note the importance of integrating women into the process of developing early warning systems so that their limitations from the perspective of gender can be identified and address to ensure that systems are more efficient and not discriminatory (Oktari et al. 2021).

Finally, another theme addressed in the articles is the important role that women can play within the community at the time of a catastrophe. One example is the post-disaster response activities of females, especially mothers, following the Pohang earthquake (2017), where they used an existing online community of women as a tool to enable active participation after the catastrophe (Kang et al. 2021). This network, beyond enabling the exchange of information, offered the women emotional support and a space within which to articulate their demands to institutions. As such, they used it not only to organise the rescue of people with dependencies, particularly children, but also to call for compensation from the government and promote reconstruction which would avoid future environmental risks, thereby facilitating their empowerment. This same strategy is behind the disaster risk reduction programmes analysed by Dhungel and Ojha (2012). This programme promotes women’s participation in all the phases of an emergency, from preventative actions to their active involvement in the rescue phase. The women in the programme are put in charge of identifying vulnerable people in their communities and participating in the construction of bioengineered embankments to protect their crops, preventative actions which ensure the community is better prepared to deal with catastrophes. During an emergency, women lead the evacuation and rescue of people that have been identified as vulnerable and actively participate in the reconstruction afterwards. It is worth highlighting the disruptive nature of this programme in terms of gender roles and the fact that those involved are illiterate and marginalised women from disadvantaged groups within communities that are themselves already vulnerable.

Quality assessment

In line with the aim of this review, namely, understanding the active role of women during the emergency phase immediately after a catastrophe, it is possible to validate the quality of the articles selected, both in terms of the methodology used and the results obtained. One of the things that stands out is the diversity of methodological approaches and techniques employed for the data collection and analysis in the studies reviewed, and that they are those which are most commonly used in the social sciences (quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods). Another is that the systematic analysis of the results has enabled themes to be identified that are common to a number of articles, thereby providing a general panorama of the role of women in evacuation and rescue. In addition, the studies make recommendations that include promoting the contribution of women and mitigating gender inequalities, as well as those arising from the intersection of gender and other forms of inequality. These recommendations lead to improved disaster risk management in the area under review. In summary, it is considered that the articles analysed meet the quality criteria for addressing the role of women in the aftermath of a disaster.

This work provides a systematic analysis of the social sciences literature which deals with the active role undertaken by women in the emergency phase following a natural origin disaster, particularly with respect to the evacuation and rescue of people. After the search and screening procedures carried out, only 25 studies were selected. This is because although the literature search was carried out in the two data bases that bring together the majority of scientific publications in the world, WoS and SCOPUS, studies of gender and disaster are relatively scarce and to a large extent those that there are focus on the medium and long-term reconstruction phases, and not on the emergency phase.

What is more, studies focusing on the emergency phase often emphasise the role played by men in rescue actions, and not so much those who are from the population experiencing the catastrophe as those who intervene as part of a professional or institutionalised group, such as firefighters, the police and volunteers, among others (Tyler and Fairbrother 2013; Enarson and Pease 2016; Rushton et al.2020; Rushton et al.2021). There is a social imaginary, widely disseminated through the media, that links the initial moments of a disaster with skills and capacities that are traditionally considered masculine, such as the use of strength, immediate mobilisation, and bravery (Rushton et al.2020; Rushton et al.2021).

These social representations make invisible the significant role played by women in the period immediately after the disaster strikes. Despite the scarcity of scientific production in this respect, those works that do exist demonstrates, on the one hand, that women undertake an active role, not only in preparing and training themselves and their families to deal with a disaster, but also in rescuing people during an evacuation (Bradshaw 2001; Cupples 2007; Dhungel and Ojha 2012; Hou and Wu 2020; Kang et al.2021). On the other hand, it can be seen that the behaviour of women during evacuation is conditioned by their traditional care role (Bateman and Edwards 2002; Alam and Collins 2010; Silver and Andrey 2014; Tyler and Fairbrother 2018). This scientific evidence challenges the stereotyped opinion widely spread through the media that, during a disaster, women are passive subjects who need to be rescued by men (Enarson 1998; Dema Moreno et al. 2022).

However, beyond this issue, the studies analysed show that risk perception is determined not only by exposure to the destructive phenomenon, but also by the social and cultural context that the disaster produces. Power systems, gender among them, influence the way that a population experiences a catastrophe and also how it responds to it and manages the risks involved. Gender differences, related to women’s lack of power and social participation in addition to their limited control over the management of the emergency, may be intensified in a catastrophe context. The articles analysed provide scientific evidence of the unequal access of men and women to information and knowledge, as well as the reduced family and community influence that women have compared to men and their subordinate role in the decision making necessary to deal with a disaster (Augustine et al.2019; Oliveira et al.2020; De Silva 2021). The result of these differences is that a disaster impacts women disproportionately, affecting their safety and limiting their survival chances. To reverse this situation it is essential that, in disaster risk management, and particularly in the emergency phase, pre-existing inequalities are taken into account. The principal recommendations that come from the texts analysed to guarantee gender inequality in an emergency consist in making visible women’s capacity for agency, ensuring their access to knowledge and information, enabling women’s autonomy in decision making and facilitating their participation in early warning systems.

Finally, this article identifies two types of limitation that refer both to the literature analysed and the process of selecting it. Despite the fact that in recent years there has been a progressive increase in the scientific production on gender and disasters, the great majority of articles published are investigations of a qualitative nature that focus specifically on a catastrophic event, are limited to a specific territory, especially English-speaking and Asian settings, and whose results are not generalisable to other contexts.

Conflicts of interest

The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Authorship contributions

R. Pérez-Gañán screened all the articles retrieved, firstly removing duplicates and then screening titles and abstracts to identify studies that clearly did not meet the inclusion criteria. S. Dema Moreno, R. González Arias and V. Cocina Díaz repeated the process to validate it. The selected articles were tabulated, analysed and discussed in the article by R. Pérez-Gañán, S. Dema Moreno, R. González Arias and Virginia Cocina Díaz. The four authors contributed equally to the writing of this article and the final approval was made by S. Dema Moreno.

Funding

This work was supported financially by the Spanish Research Agency through the GENDER (Gender, Disasters and Risk) Project, FEM 2017-86852-P.

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How do women face the emergency after a catastrophic event? A PRISMA 2020 systematic review

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Abstract

Aim

Method

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Conclusions

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Introduction

Methods

Information sources and inclusion criteria

Search strategy and selection process

Screening

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Data extraction

Study risk of bias assessment

Results

Discussion

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References

Status:

Version 1