INTRODUCTION: Connections between environmental factors and mental health issues have been postulated in many different countries around the world. Previously undertaken research has shown many possible connections between these fields, especially in relation to air quality and extreme weather events. However, research on this subject is lacking in New Zealand, which is difficult to analyse as an overall nation due to its many micro-climates and regional differences.OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study and subsequent analysis is to explore the associations between environmental factors and poor mental health outcomes in New Zealand by region and predict the number of people with mental health-related illnesses corresponding to the environmental influence.METHODS: Data are collected from various public-available sources, e.g., Stats NZ and Coronial services of New Zealand, which comprised four environmental factors of our interest and two mental health indicators data ranging from 2016 up until 2020. The four environmental factors are air pollution, earthquakes, rainfall and temperature. Two mental health indicators include the number of people seen by District Health Boards (DHBs) for mental health reasons and the statistics on suicide deaths. The initial analysis is carried out on which regions were most affected by the chosen environmental factors. Further analysis using Auto-Regressive Integrated Moving Average(ARIMA) creates a model based on time series of environmental data to generate estimation for the next two years and mental health projected from the ridge regression.RESULTS: In our initial analysis, the environmental data was graphed along with mental health outcomes in regional charts to identify possible associations. Different regions of New Zealand demonstrate quite different relationships between the environmental data and mental health outcomes. The result of later analysis predicts that the suicide rate and DHB mental health visits may increase in Wellington, drop-in Hawke's Bay and slightly increase in Canterbury for the year 2021 and 2022 with different environmental factors considered.CONCLUSION: It is evident that the relationship between environmental and mental health factors is regional and not national due to the many micro-climates that exist around the nation. However, it was observed that not all factors displayed a good relationship between the regions. We conclude that our hypotheses were partially correct, in that increased air pollution was found to correlate to increased mental health-related DHB visits. Rainfall was also highly correlated to some mental health outcomes. Higher levels of rainfall reduced DHB visits and suicide rates in some areas of the country.
Blended learning plays an important role in many tertiary institutions but little has been written about the implementation of blended learning in times of adversity, natural disaster or crisis. This paper describes how, in the wake of the 22 February Canterbury earthquake, five teacher educators responded to crisis-driven changing demands and changing directions. Our narratives describe how blended learning provided students in initial teacher education programmes with some certainty and continuity during a time of civil emergency. The professional learning generated from our experiences provides valuable insights for designing and preparing for blended learning in times of crisis, as well as developing resilient blended learning programmes for the future.
For 150,000 Christchurch school students, the 12.51 pm earthquake of 22 February 2011 shattered their normal lunch time activities and thrust their teachers into the role of emergency first responders. Whether helping students (children) escape immediate danger, or identifying and managing the best strategies for keeping children safe, including provision of extended caregiving when parents were unable to return to school to retrieve their children, teachers had to manage their own fears and trauma reactions in order to appear calm and prevent further distress for the children in their care. Only then did teachers return to their families. Eighteen months later, twenty teachers from across Christchurch, were interviewed. At 12.51pm, the teachers were essentially first responders. Using their usual methods for presenting a calm and professional image, the teachers’ emotion regulation (ER) strategies for managing their immediate fears were similar to those of professional first responders, with similar potential for subsequent burnout and negative emotional effects. Teachers’ higher emotional exhaustion and burnout 18 months later, were associated with school relocation. Lower burnout was associated with more emotional awareness, ER and perceived support. Consistent with international research, teachers’ use of cognitive reappraisal (re-thinking a situation) was an effective ER strategy, but this may not prevent teachers’ emotional resources from eventually becoming depleted. Teachers fulfill an important role in supporting children’s psychosocial adjustment following a natural disaster. However, as also acknowledged in international research, we need to also focus on supporting the teachers themselves.
War and natural disasters share many features including great loss of life, traumatised populations and haunting memories. The Christchurch earthquakes were the third most costly event of 2011 with total costs of up to $NZ30 billion. Many homes, communities, families and an established way of life have gone for ever. The paper comes from the Women’s Voices project that documents women’s narratives of earthquake trauma and loss and examines their profiles of emotional expression associated with coping. For these women in Christchurch, solace is not about talking experiences of suffering but by doing practical things that inform and are shaped by existing personal narratives. As they relayed this common arc, they also entered into national (and gendered) narrative themes of being practical, stoic, independent and resourceful in the face of tragedy and loss and so embody communal aspects of coping with loss and grief particular to the New Zealand even ‘the South Island settler’ identity narrative. These narratives suggest it useful to rethink key concepts that inform our understanding of coping with disaster and loss.
When the devastating 6.3 magnitude earthquake hit Christchurch, Aotearoa New Zealand, at 12.51pm on 22nd February 2011, the psychological and physical landscape was irrevocably changed. In the days and weeks following the disaster communities were isolated due to failed infrastructure, continuing aftershocks and the extensive search and rescue effort which focussed resources on the central business district. In such moments the resilience of a community is truly tested. This research discusses the role of grassroots community groups in facilitating community resilience during the Christchurch 2010/11 earthquakes and the role of place in doing so. I argue that place specific strategies for urban resilience need to be enacted from a grassroots level while being supported by broader policies and agencies. Using a case study of Project Lyttelton – a group aspiring towards a resilient sustainable future who were caught at the epicentre of the February earthquake – I demonstrate the role of a community group in creating resilience through self-organised place specific action during a disaster. The group provided emotional care, basic facilities and rebuilding assistance to the residents of Lyttelton, proving to be an invaluable asset. These actions are closely linked to the characteristics of social support and social learning that have been identified as important to socio-ecological resilience. In addition this research will seek to understand and explore the nuances of place and identity and its role in shaping resilience to such dis-placing events. Drawing on community narratives of the displacement of place identity, the potential for a progressive sense of place as instigated by local groups will be investigated as an avenue for adaptation by communities at risk of disaster and place destabilisation.
Tsunami events including the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami and the 2011 Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami confirmed the need for Pacific-wide comprehensive risk mitigation and effective tsunami evacuation planning. New Zealand is highly exposed to tsunamis and continues to invest in tsunami risk awareness, readiness and response across the emergency management and science sectors. Evacuation is a vital risk reduction strategy for preventing tsunami casualties. Understanding how people respond to warnings and natural cues is an important element to improving evacuation modelling techniques. The relative rarity of tsunami events locally in Canterbury and also globally, means there is limited knowledge on tsunami evacuation behaviour, and tsunami evacuation planning has been largely informed by hurricane evacuations. This research aims to address this gap by analysing evacuation behaviour and movements of Kaikōura and Southshore/New Brighton (coastal suburb of Christchurch) residents following the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake. Stage 1 of the research is engaging with both these communities and relevant hazard management agencies, using a survey and community workshops to understand real-event evacuation behaviour during the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake and subsequent tsunami evacuations. The second stage is using the findings from stage 1 to inform an agent-based tsunami evacuation model, which is an approach that simulates of the movement of people during an evacuation response. This method improves on other evacuation modelling approaches to estimate evacuation times due to better representation of local population characteristics. The information provided by the communities will inform rules and interactions such as traffic congestion, evacuation delay times and routes taken to develop realistic tsunami evacuation models. This will allow emergency managers to more effectively prepare communities for future tsunami events, and will highlight recommended actions to increase the safety and efficiency of future tsunami evacuations.
<b>Aotearoa has undoubtedly some of the most beautiful landscapes in the world, a privilege for its inhabitants. However, as our cities have developed post-colonisation, the connection between the natural environment and its occupants has diminished. Designers play a vital role within an ever evolving world to progress the built environment in a way that reflects and restores vital values that have been deprioritised. Future practice should prioritise diversity, care for the land, enhancement of community space, and sustainable practices.</b>
This research sets out to demonstrate that new design methodologies can encourage kaitiakitanga, whilst meeting the needs of urban public space. Initially through critical analysis and literature based research, a study of Ōtautahi Christchurch, the South Island’s largest city, was undertaken. The principles of a ‘15 minute city’ were also explored and applied to the city, establishing issues within the built environment that drove the overall research direction.
Through the tools of critical reflection and a research through design methodology, a design toolkit was constructed. This toolkit sets out to provide designers with a simple streamlined method of developing urban interventions that are sustainable and beneficial for human well-being. The toolkit incorporates an abstraction of the ‘15 minute city’ ideology and introduces the concepts of evolving green transportation routes within cities. Ōtautahi Christchurch, a city with a significant history of earthquake-caused damage, was chosen as the primary site for the application of this research’s proposed toolkit. The city becomes a canvas for an urban rebuild that explores and aims to set a precedent for a progressive 21st-century city.
A key finding as the toolkit research developed was the idea of a ‘temporary’ phase or intervention, being added to traditional design methodologies prior to permanent building. The research explains how this temporary phase could more actively engage diverse user groups and create active conversations between communities and designers.
The refined toolkit sets outs proposed timeline phases, methods of site analysis and development of design drivers. Alongside this, a modular architectural system establishes a design proposal for the temporary phase of an individual site within an evolving green route. This outcome provides further opportunity for realistic testing, which would actively involve communities and aims to shift our priorities within urban development. The introduction of the ‘temporary’ phase is beneficial in mitigating psychological implications on people and limiting physical impacts on the landscape.
The final design stage of the thesis applied the toolkit process to three sites in Ōtautahi Christchurch. Through a holistic lens, the toolkit framework set out methods to collate information that provides guidance for development on the sites. While some layers are initiated simply by recognising site characteristics, others are informed through software such as GIS.
Connected by a proposed green transport route, the three initial sites are developed with temporary interventions that utilise the modular design set out previously in the research. Contextualising the interventions on real world sites tested the flexibility of the system and allowed for critical reflection on the applicability of the toolkit to Aotearoa.
The research concludes by identifying future research opportunities and speculates on possible applications of its findings within the real world. Temporary Permanence highlights the significant role that we, as designers, have in shifting urban priorities to create more holistic, sustainable, and inclusive cities for people and the planet.
