Treading Water: Stress and Coping in the Wake of the Flint Water Crisis

Background and Purpose: Since April 2014, the environmental injustice known as the Flint Water Crisis has directly affected thousands of Flint residents. While the extent of harm caused by the human-made crisis may never be fully comprehensible, the aim of this study was to capture and amplify the experience of those most affected, regarding the unique stressors they now face and the resilience with which they continue to move forward despite inadequate sociopolitical response. It is important for social work researchers to understand the impacts of environmental disasters on community residents so that they can engage with residents to mitigate, create linkages, and boost and protect social and community supports.

Methods:  A household survey was used to guide in-person interviews with a randomly selected sample of 586 households of Genesee and Wayne counties. Approximately two-thirds of the sample (62%) was female, with a mean age of 56. Nearly half identified as African American (47%) and half Caucasian (47%). Approximately 40% reported being employed. Based on previous surveys used with victims of Hurricane Katrina, interviewers asked open-ended questions to capture resident perspectives on stress and coping and close-ended questions about community involvement activities because of the crisis. The qualitative data was coded for thematic content, cross-checked for internal validity of coding, and quantified in SPSS for further analysis. Categorical grouping of coping methods was informed by previous study of mental health and the Flint Water Crisis done by Cuthbertson et al. (2016) so that comparisons may be made. Descriptive analysis was conducted with quantitative data.

Results:  The most commonly discussed stressors regarded sympathy and concern for family members and the Flint community, everyday inconvenience, injustice and lack of trust in officials, health problems experienced, and increased financial burden. The most commonly methods of coping were practical/tangible action (e.g. using and stocking bottled water), engagement in mutual aid (e.g. talking about it, helping others), disengagement from the issue (e.g. “It doesn’t affect me”), and seeking religious/spiritual support (e.g. prayer). Residents reported that they used medical advice, spiritual guidance, social media and attended community meetings more frequently after the water crisis.

Conclusions and Implications: Our findings illustrate the variety of ways in which the community affected by the ongoing crisis experiences the resulting hardships as defined by individual members, and the contrasting way in which some members, perhaps by virtue of residing outside of Flint, understand or at least describe their experience as unaffected by the crisis. Although the water crisis induced periods of stress, residents demonstrated adaptive capacities that signal resilience. It galvanized community competence, boosting natural supports and collective efficacy. Increased understanding of resilience, empathy, and disengagement may have useful implications for more situationally appropriate and effective therapeutic and political interventions, leading our broader community away from a crisis outcome of merely “adapted functioning [to] persistent dysfunction” (Norris et al., 2007, p. 132) and toward one that reflects a community, as one interviewee appeals, “returned better than whole.”