Crisis and emergency risk communication as an integrative model
Abstract
This article describes a model of communication known as crisis and emergency risk communication (CERC). The model is outlined as a merger of many traditional notions of health and risk communication with work in crisis and disaster communication. The specific kinds of communication activities that should be called for at various stages of disaster or crisis development are outlined. Although crises are by definition uncertain, equivocal, and often chaotic situations, the CERC model is presented as a tool health communicators can use to help manage these complex events.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Crisis and risk communication models indicate that grasping risk perceptions is essential for an effective and suitable crisis response.
“Models of crisis and risk communication thus suggest that understanding risk perceptions is critical for an effective and appropriate crisis response.7”
From Monitoring behavioural insights related to COVID-19 (2020) · cites this paper as [7]
Cites
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Branum, A. (2007) · Sage eBooks · doi:10.4135/9781412952644.n74 · Cited by 6,434 · see citing works
Ongoing Crisis Communication: Planning, Managing, and Responding
Coombs, W. T. (1999) · Cited by 2,462 · see citing works
Rogers, E. M., & Deetz, S. A. (1993) · Contemporary Sociology A Journal of Reviews · doi:10.2307/2075811 · Cited by 1,075 · see citing works
The Organizational and Interorganizational Development of Disasters
Turner, B. A. (1976) · Administrative Science Quarterly · doi:10.2307/2391850 · Cited by 876 · cited 3× · see citing works
“Although Reynolds’s (2002) CERC model uses five stages, others have six-stage (Turner, 1976) and three-stage models of crisis development (Coombs, 1995; Ray, 1999; Seeger et al., 1998).”
BackgroundMethodCoombs, W. T. (1995) · Management Communication Quarterly · doi:10.1177/0893318995008004003 · Cited by 807 · see citing works
Public relations: Strategies and tactics
Wilcox, D. L., Ault, P. H., & Agee, W. K. (1992) · Public Relations Review · doi:10.1016/0363-8111(92)90031-s · Cited by 782 · see citing works
Keeney, R. L., & von Winterfeldt, D. (1986) · Risk Analysis · doi:10.1111/j.1539-6924.1986.tb00954.x · Cited by 768 · see citing works
Hazard Warning Systems: Review of 20 Years of Progress
Sorensen, J. H. (2000) · Natural Hazards Review · doi:10.1061/(asce)1527-6988(2000)1:2(119 · Cited by 615 · see citing works
Communication, Organization, and Crisis
Seeger, M. W., Sellnow, T. L., & Ulmer, R. R. (1998) · Annals of the International Communication Association · doi:10.1080/23808985.1998.11678952 · Cited by 554 · see citing works
Disaster Response: Principles of Preparation and Coordination
McNally, V. P., & der Heide, E. A. (1992) · Public Productivity & Management Review · doi:10.2307/3380618 · Cited by 441 · see citing works
(2012) · Routledge eBooks · doi:10.4324/9780203856772 · Cited by 415 · see citing works
Risk Communication: A handbook for communicating environmental, safety, and health risks
(2015) · Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health · doi:10.1111/1753-6405.12333 · Cited by 394 · see citing works
Responding to Community Outrage
(1993) · doi:10.3320/978-0-932627-51-3 · Cited by 291 · see citing works
Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication
Reynolds, B. (2005) · Applied Biosafety · doi:10.1177/153567600501000106 · Cited by 241 · see citing works
Self-citationChaos theory, informational needs, and natural disasters
Sellnow, T. L., Seeger, M. W., & Ulmer, R. R. (2002) · Journal of Applied Communication Research · doi:10.1080/00909880216599 · Cited by 241 · see citing works
Mad cows and mother's milk: the perils of poor risk communication
(1998) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.35-5035 · Cited by 209 · see citing works
Ulmer, R. R., & Sellnow, T. L. (2000) · Journal of Business Ethics · doi:10.1023/a:1006183805499 · Cited by 202 · see citing works
Risk Communication: An Emerging Area of Health Communication Research
Covello, V. T. (1992) · Annals of the International Communication Association · doi:10.1080/23808985.1992.11678816 · Cited by 185 · see citing works
Evacuation Behavior and Problems: Findings and Implications from the Research Literature.
Quarantelli, E. L. (1980) · Library, Museums and Press - UDSpace (University of Delaware) · Cited by 174 · see citing works
Barton, L. (2000) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 173 · see citing works
Chaos and crisis: propositions for a general theory of crisis communication
Seeger, M. W. (2002) · Public Relations Review · doi:10.1016/s0363-8111(02)00168-6 · Cited by 164 · see citing works
Communicating the Threat of Emerging Infections to the Public
Freimuth, V. S., Linnan, H., & Potter, P. (2000) · Emerging infectious diseases · doi:10.3201/eid0604.000403 · Cited by 158 · see citing works
Powell, D., & Leiss, W. (1997) · McGill-Queen's University Press eBooks · doi:10.1515/9780773566644 · Cited by 137 · see citing works
Strategic Communication in Crisis Management: Lessons from the Airline Industry
(2003) · Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management · doi:10.1111/1468-5973.1103010_1 · Cited by 136 · see citing works
Communication and Terrorism : Public and Media Responses to 9/11
Greenberg, B. S. (2002) · Cited by 124 · see citing works
(2008) · Journal of Drug Education · doi:10.2190/de.38.4.h · Cited by 120 · see citing works
Ropeik, D. P., & Gray, G. M. (2002) · Medical Entomology and Zoology · Cited by 112 · see citing works
Organizational crisis experience and public relations roles
Guth, D. W. (1995) · Public Relations Review · doi:10.1016/0363-8111(95)90003-9 · Cited by 111 · see citing works
Public Relations and Crisis Communication: Organizing and Chaos
Seeger, M. W., Sellnow, T. L., & Ulmer, R. R. (2001) · Sage eBooks · doi:10.4135/9781452220727.n11 · Cited by 110 · see citing works
Effects of fear appeals and physiological arousal upon emotion, attitudes, and cigarette smoking.
Rogers, R. W., & Deckner, C. W. (1975) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.32.2.222 · Cited by 108 · see citing works
Effects of fear appeals and physiological arousal upon emotion, attitudes, and cigarette smoking.
Rogers, R. W., & Deckner, C. W. (1975) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-3514.32.2.222 · Cited by 105 · see citing works
Generating Effective Risk Messages: How Scary Should Your Risk Communication Be?
Witte, K. (1995) · Annals of the International Communication Association · doi:10.1080/23808985.1995.11678914 · Cited by 104 · see citing works
Joe Sampson, K. W. (2001) · Journal of Health Communication · doi:10.1080/108107301317140823 · Cited by 102 · see citing works
Self-Efficacy and Rural Women's Performance of Breast and Cervical Cancer Detection Practices
Nichole Egbert, R. P. (2001) · Journal of Health Communication · doi:10.1080/108107301752384415 · Cited by 75 · see citing works
Exxon Valdez: How to spend billions and still get a black eye
Small, W. J. (1991) · Public Relations Review · doi:10.1016/0363-8111(91)90003-4 · Cited by 72 · see citing works
Media use, information seeking, and reported needs in post crisis contexts
Seeger, M. W., Venette, S. J., Ulmer, R. R., & Sellnow, T. L. (2002) · Cited by 68 · see citing works
Jackson, M. M., Rickman, L. S., & Pugliese, G. (2000) · AJN American Journal of Nursing · doi:10.1097/00000446-200010000-00058 · Cited by 53 · see citing works
Communicating Foodborne Disease Risk
Fischhoff, B., & Downs, J. S. (1997) · Emerging infectious diseases · doi:10.3201/eid0304.970412 · Cited by 47 · see citing works
The Effects of High and Low Fear Messages about Drugs
Smart, R. G., & Fejer, D. (1974) · Journal of Drug Education · doi:10.2190/1v5h-1nk5-qnxm-465f · Cited by 38 · see citing works
Responsible Communication: Ethical Issues in Business, Industry, and the Professions
Jaksa, J. A., Pritchard, M. S., & Dervin, B. L. (1996) · Cited by 32 · see citing works
Radiation protection measurement
Kiefer, H., & Maushart, R. (1972) · CERN Document Server (European Organization for Nuclear Research) · Cited by 21 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Houston, J. B., Hawthorne, J., Perreault, M. F., Park, E. H., Goldstein Hode, M., Halliwell, M. R., Turner McGowen, S. E., Davis, R., Vaid, S., McElderry, J. A., et al. (2015) · Disasters · doi:10.1111/disa.12092 · Cited by 869 · see citing works
Monitoring behavioural insights related to COVID-19
Betsch, C., Wieler, L. H., & Habersaat, K. (2020) · The Lancet · doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(20)30729-7 · Cited by 335 · see citing works
The impact of social media on risk perceptions during the MERS outbreak in South Korea
Choi, D.-H., Yoo, W., Noh, G.-Y., & Park, K. (2017) · Computers in Human Behavior · doi:10.1016/j.chb.2017.03.004 · Cited by 246 · see citing works
Population-based post-crisis psychological distress: an example from the SARS outbreak in Taiwan
Peng, E. Y.-C., Lee, M.-B., Tsai, S.-T., Yang, C.-C., Morisky, D. E., Tsai, L.-T., Weng, Y.-L., & Lyu, S.-Y. (2010) · Journal of the Formosan Medical Association · doi:10.1016/s0929-6646(10)60087-3 · Cited by 227 · see citing works
Best practices in risk and crisis communication: Implications for natural hazards management
Steelman, T. A., & McCaffrey, S. (2013) · Natural Hazards · doi:10.1007/s11069-012-0386-z · Cited by 213 · see citing works
Communications in public health emergency preparedness: a systematic review of the literature
Savoia, E., Lin, L., & Viswanath, K. (2013) · Biosecurity and Bioterrorism: Biodefense Strategy, Practice, and Science · doi:10.1089/bsp.2013.0038 · Cited by 120 · see citing works
Communicating crisis uncertainty: A review of the knowledge gaps
Liu, B. F., Bartz, L., & Duke, N. (2016) · Public Relations Review · doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2016.03.003 · Cited by 115 · see citing works
Tandoc, E. C., & Lee, J. C. B. (2022) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444820968212 · Cited by 101 · see citing works
Application of social media analytics in tourism crisis communication
Park, D., Kim, W. G., & Choi, S. (2019) · Current Issues in Tourism · doi:10.1080/13683500.2018.1504900 · Cited by 98 · see citing works
Loveth, R.-O., & Emmanuel, I. (2025) · Journal of Media, Journalism & Mass Communication · doi:10.54536/jmjmc.v1i1.5644
- Authors
- REYNOLDS, B., & W. SEEGER, M.
- Affiliations
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US)
- Venue
- Journal of Health Communication
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2005-02-23
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 43-55
- ISSN
- 1081-0730 (ISSN-L)
- 1087-0415
- OpenAlex
- W2151187076
- Cited by
- 1,287
- References
- 41
- Citations by year
- 2026: 114 · 2025: 109 · 2024: 82 · 2023: 103 · 2022: 146 · 2021: 162 · 2020: 113 · 2019: 56 · 2018: 64 · 2017: 42 · 2016: 55 · 2015: 44 · 2014: 50 · 2013: 33 · 2012: 24
- FWCI
- 37.81
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Health Communication (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Communication › Public Relations and Crisis Communication
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Disaster Management and Resilience
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › Emergency Medical Services › Disaster Response and Management
- Keywords
- crisis and emergency risk communication, risk communication, health communication, disaster communication, crisis communication, communication models, uncertainty
- MeSH terms
- Communication, Disaster Planning, Emergencies, Humans, Public Health, Risk
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review