Analyzing rural people’s resilience in the face of floodwater: Evidence from Iran

In recent decades, many regions of the world have been affected by floods, which has caused a serious damage to rural communities, whose economy is based on agriculture and animal husbandry. One of the important dimensions in this field is the resilience of people in order to reduce the effects before, during and after the flood. Accordingly, the present study aimed to analyze rural people’s resilience in the face of floodwater (RPRF). For this purpose, a theoretical framework, whose main core is the VBN theory [including a chain of environmental attitudes (EAF), beliefs (BFF) and social norms (NFF) in facing floods], and also the variables of place attachment (PA), time perspective (TP), knowledge in the face of floods (KF) and organizational adaptation capacity (OAC) were used to analyze RPRF. This research is a descriptive-correlational and causal-relational type that was conducted with a survey. The statistical population included the villagers of Lorestan Province, Iran, who were affected by floods (N = 6906), of which 330 people are selected as a sample. The research instrument was a questionnaire. The results of causal analysis indicated that TP (β = 0.429), PA (β = 0.333) and OAC (β = 0.305) have the highest direct effect on RPRF, respectively. Also, EAF had the greatest non-causal effect (0.145) on RPRF. This study can be insightful for decision-makers and policy-makers to deal with floods in rural areas by emphasizing the variables of human ecology from the point of view of environmental psychology in the conceptualization of some basic elements effective on RPRF. Graphical abstract