Gender differences in human behaviors during an earthquake

Abstract

This study aims to determine whether human behavior in buildings during an earthquake varies according to gender. The history of devastating earthquakes in Turkey, including the 7.4 magnitude earthquake in Istanbul in 1999, the 6.8 magnitude earthquake in Elazığ in 2020, the 7.7 and 7.6 magnitude earthquakes in Kahramanmaraş in 2023, affecting 11 provinces, and the expected devastating earthquake in Istanbul, experts warn, underscores the urgency of understanding human reactions during seismic events. This study, which is currently part of a project supported by The Scientific and Technological Council of Turkey (TUBITAK, 121K930 project number), examines the indoor recordings during the earthquakes in Elazig on January 24, 2020, and in İzmir on October 30, 2020, and also analyzes the people’s behavior during the earthquake. In this direction, video recordings taken from the YouTube, archives of İzmir and Elazığ AFAD Directorates and metropolitan municipalities are examined. A total of 60 video analyzes are carried out from Elazığ and İzmir. The descriptive statistic has been used with the SPSS 23.0 package program in the data analysis. The results shows that women mostly took protective measures and exhibited human-oriented behavior. In contrast, men were mainly remaining stable or heading toward the door. Unlike the literature, these findings reveal that human behavior during earthquakes cannot be reduced to a single behavior pattern, such as drop-cover-hold-on. According to the results, it is necessary to understand the behaviors of individuals during the earthquake by considering gender and sociocultural variables and to develop practical policy proposals. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2024.