Faculty members' earthquake preparedness levels and their related factors: a cross-sectional study from a university in a high-risk earthquake zone in Turkey

Background: this cross-sectional study aimed to determine the earthquake preparedness levelsand related factors of the faculty members working at a university located in a province in afirst-degree earthquake zone in turkey.methods: the total number of faculty members at the university is 457, including 314 assistantprofessors, 63 associate professors, and 80 full professors. the study group included 177(38.7%) of 457 faculty members. the dependent variable of the study is the attitudes of thefaculty members towards earthquake preparedness. the independent variables were age,gender, marital status, having children, living with or without children, duration of residency inkarabuk. in addition, these were also included as variables, respectively, type of housing,property ownership, work experience, exposure to natural disasters in the past, and theawareness that karabuk is a first-degree risk earthquake zone. the data were collected using adescriptive questionnaire and mulilis-lippa earthquake preparedness scale. data wereanalyzed using chi-square tests and binary logistic regression model and spss 20.0 software.results: there was only one (0.6%) faculty member who stated that he meets all of thepreparatory criteria of the mulilis-lippa earthquake preparedness scale. the probability of lowmaterials preparedness score increased by 2.31 (95% ci 1.1-4.7) and 4.53 (95% ci 1.4-14.4)when the faculty members were renters and working as faculty members for 15 years and over,respectively. being a renter also increased the probability of common knowledge and skill scoreby 1.95 (95% ci 1.0-3.8).conclusions: this study showed that earthquake preparedness levels among the facultymembers are insufficient and suggests that motivation of the faculty members’ motivation to beappropriately prepared for future earthquake case should be increased.