干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

The objective is to develop a measure of perceived risk underlying urban water consumption (UWC) that is applicable in situations of drought and strong rainfall. First, we analyse existing scales and the dimensions involved in perceived risk related to UWC. Second, we test our proposed scale using two studies. Study 1 was carried out in Spain in 2012 (n = 701) during a period of heavy rains. Study 2 was performed in 2014 in the semi-arid area of Spain (n = 477) during a long drought period. The proposed scale has three dimensions (impact, time-related and control) and high reliabilities (0.86-0.89), validities (convergent, discriminant, construct) and is invariant between both rainy and dry periods. UWC Perceived Risk Scale fits into a Pearson ’Type VI distribution’, which can serve scholars and technicians in measuring urban water perceived risk in their researches and urban water management projects.