A warning is not a press release

A podium with microphones in front of a red background lit with spotlights.

This week I had the pleasure of observing an excellent PhD defense that focused on alert and warning practices. Lauren Cain, PhD, discussed the inclusion of content described as "organizational response information" that is found in a small subset of alerts and warnings issued as WEAs. This information, or ORI, isn't recommended by alert and warning researchers, and yet it sneaks its way into messages here and there, especially those written for law enforcement activity. You might see it in messages that say "law enforcement is on the scene" or "responders are on their way" or "crews are en route." Where does it come from?

Dr. Cain's research showed that this practice stems largely from PIO training, especially that which is conducted for law enforcement and for public health. She specifically found references to the idea that "you have to tell people what you're doing" in the Crisis Emergency Risk Communication (CERC) training manuals created for the CDC.

In many cases, it does make sense to issue a message that includes a mention of responders on their way to the scene. It can confirm that the dangerous situation is being actively managed by local officials. This information may help to reduce some of the fear and uncertainty that comes with those active threat events. There is a need for additional research to provide a deeper assessment, but initial findings suggest that for an active shooter situation, adding this information can be useful if you have the room in your character-restricted message.

But it also raises a concern for me. If you look at templates for press briefings and press releases, you'll see that they start with the following:

"at approximately [time] this morning, law enforcement responded to an incident at [location]..."

This same practice seems to be making its way into warnings. In fact at a recent training conducted by The Warn Room, every group wrote their first alert for an active threat by following this exact format. Even after a full day of training on the Warning Response Model and the evidence-based structure and contents for an effective alert, some were still following that press-release format for their messages.

Does it matter? So long as all of the key contents are included in a warning message, does the structure of the message and the order of contents matter to message receivers? One might think that it does not. But we have evidence from research that it does.

One publication that tested the effectiveness of the Warning Lexicon - built messages showed that unstructured complete messages did not perform as well as structured complete messages for message understanding, believing, and efficacy. Both messages were complete (including source, hazard, location, guidance, and time) but one lacked a cohesive structure that included stylistic features like ALL CAPS to emphasize key words. In other words - the format of the message does make a difference. We replicated this study in 5 other states and found the same outcomes.

What do we make of this? Well, first off, we need to stop treating a warning like a press release. It may be difficult to leave behind the style adopted by PIOs and emphasized in PIO trainings, but a warning is not a press release. It's a message designed to motivate action, not reputation management.

Second, we need to adopt the practices supported by evidence. This means following the Warning Response Model and the structure included in the Warning Lexicon. It also means incorporating ORI sparingly - such as in active shooter messages.

If you'd like to learn more about effective alerts and warnings, be sure to download the Warning Lexicon and the Post Alert Lexicon.

This blog was written by Jeannette Sutton without the help of AI.