Hot Dog Suits and Runaway Corgis: Playing Towards an "Earthquake Culture" 4/20

When (NOT if!) the next magnitude 9 earthquake strikes the Pacific Northwest, it will trigger the worst disaster in U.S. history. But Oregon is seismically sneaky, seldom shaken by moderate-sized earthquakes in between Big Ones. How can we create a resilient “earthquake culture” without first-hand experience to motivate us? Geologist Liz Safran thinks that imaginative media – including novels like Tilt – can play a key role in helping us grasp the real. Her research team conducts experiments involving custom-made video games (all freely available at Cascadia9game.org) to better understand earthquake preparedness behavior among young adults. In this talk, Dr. Safran will describe the key take-aways of her research and the ways that video games can help us rehearse disasters. 

For the Calendar of events page: Dr. Safran is a geomorphologist by training (think floods and landslides) and is now obsessed with the Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake. She got her undergraduate degree from Harvard University, an M.Sc. from University of Washington, and a Ph.D. from University of California, Santa Barbara. Her most recent research uses custom-made video games in experiments to better understand what motivates young adults to prepare for earthquakes. She is also a member of the Oregon Seismic Safety Policy Advisory Commission and of her Neighborhood Emergency Team. 

You can watch this program via livestream on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@lakeoswegopubliclibrary/live

For more information, contact Nancy Niland at nniland@lakeoswego.city or (503) 675-2538.