Responding to an emergency: the bradyseismic phenomenon and “Quelli della zona rossa”

This paper addresses the field of risk communication and the necessity for it to increasingly adopt a person-centered approach. Indeed, the hierarchy of expert - social media - user communication has thinned considerably in recent times. Individuals, through social media, project online what occurs in the offline environment, thus contributing to the spreading of emotions via the sharing dynamics. The objective of this exploratory study is to examine a particular emergency context, the bradyseismic emergency in the Phlegrean area of Naples. The aim is to analyze the perceptions of risk from the point of view of the people themselves and to investigate how these are transferred to the online environment. After the concepts of subjective and objective perceived risk have been operationalised, a mixed approach was used, combining longitudinal, cross-sectional and text analysis. The results will provide insight into the emergency communication in the Phlegraean context between August and October 2023, and potential strategies for improvement in interventions that follow a bottom-up approach.