Developing Social Norms towards a Culture of Resilience

Psychology tells us that human beings tend to follow behavioural rules to ensure that we are acting in an acceptable way. These rules are referred to as social norms, and they can be utilized to influence the way people behave. The Cultural Resilience programme worked to understand the social norms that underpin a resilient culture in New Zealand, harnessing and building on them to improve our national resilience.

The research took an an outcome-focused approach to clearly define the best tools and strategies to facilitate resilience becoming an integral part of “what we do and who we are”. Using diverse research methods including co-creation with key stakeholders and end users, the programme team investigated new and rapidly evolving technologies, and determined the ways these can be harnessed to develop social norms of resilience across diverse communities and hazard profiles. Norms were considered in the context of location, sudden shocks (e.g. earthquakes, storms, wildfires) and incremental hazards (e.g. sea-level rise).