The Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 induced massive temporary relocation of the people in the Maldives, from the small atolls they lived in to nearby larger atolls. Once they were permitted to return home, some evacuees proved reluctant to leave temporary housing due to a better livelihood. On the occasion of the accident at the nuclear power plant caused by the tsunami brought by the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, all the residents of Hirono Town in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, were forced to evacuate over a long period. Many of them lived in temporary housing built in Iwaki City in the same prefecture. Some of the evacuees, as was the case in the Maldives, showed reluctance to return home, on the ground that livelihood in the temporary housing was both convenient and enjoyable. It was a surprise for national and local governments because they assumed that those in temporary housing were uncomfortable and that the evacuees were keen to leave to return home. Differences in information existed between the evacuees and the government. This study aims to determine why such a disparity emerged and was left unrevealed. It also tries to reveal what the observed differences led to after the evacuees returned home. Furthermore, it examines the impact of mass media on the minds of the general public. It finds that the evacuees’ minds changed over time as they initially found themselves away from home, living in temporary housing and unhappy. Mass media conveyed unupdated and confusing messages to society, as if evacuees were actually unhappy. Society thus tended to regard the displaced as unhappy forever, while the evacuees found their livelihood in temporary housing comfortable or even enjoyable to the extent that some decided not to return home by becoming residents of Iwaki City. Society should be aware that evacuees’ idea and behavior may drastically change over time – even beyond their imagination.

1. [1] A. Suppasri, K. Goto, A. Muhari, P. Ranasinghe, M. Riyaz, M. Affan, E. Mas, M. Yasuda, and F. Imamura , “A decade after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami: The progress in disaster preparedness and future challenges in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Maldives,” Pure and Applied Geophysics, Vol.172, No.12, pp. 3313-3341, doi: 10.1007/s00024-015-1134-6, 2015.
2. [2] Anonymous, Interviews by the author with anonymous informants at National Disaster Management Centre, Male, Maldives, September 26, 2015.
3. [3] United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), “Words Into Action Disaster Displacement: How to Reduce Risk, Address Impacts and Strengthen Resilience,” 2019, https://www.preventionweb.net/files/58821_wiadisasterdisplacement190511webeng.pdf [accessed September 5, 2021]
4. [4] United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR), “Chair’s Summary: 2017 Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction,” 2017, http://www.unisdr.org/files/53989_chairssummaryofthe2017globalplatfor.pdf [accessed September 5, 2021]
5. [5] UN General Assembly, “Report of the Open-Ended Intergovernmental Expert Working Group on Indicators and Terminology Relating to Disaster Risk Reduction,” 2016, http://undocs.org/A/71/644 [accessed September 5, 2021]
6. [6] Y. Amano, “The Fukushima Daiichi Accident: Report by the Director General,” International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), 2015, https://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/Publications/PDF/AdditionalVolumes/P1710/Pub1710-TV1-Web.pdf [accessed March 10, 2021]
7. [7] F. Ranghiere and M. Ishiwatari (Eds), “Learning from megadisasters: Lessons from the Great East Japan Earthquake,” World Bank, 2014, https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/18864/web%E7%94%A8_%E5%85%A8%E4%BD%93%E7%89%88PDF-LearningFromMegadisasters.pdf?sequence=5 (in Japanese) [accessed March 10, 2021]
8. [8] C. Bruch, S. Karimi, J. Manatunge, and M. Nakayama, “Barriers to Long-Term Return after the Great East Japan Earthquake: Lessons from Hirono Town,” J. of Asian Development, Vol.3, No.1, pp. 23-39, doi: 10.5296/jad.v3i1.10650, 2017
9. [9] Hirono Town, “Hirono cho no hinan karano fukko ho genjo to kongo no torikumi ni tsuite [Recovery from evacuation of the Hirono Town of these days and provision for future],” May 2020, https://www.reconstruction.go.jp/topics/main-cat1/sub-cat1-4/f12fup/20200606_6-4hironomachi.pdf (in Japanese) [accessed March 10, 2021]
10. [10] Anonymous, Interviews by the author with anonymous informants at Hirono Town government, Hirono (Fukushima, Japan), September16 to 18, 2015.
11. [11] Central Disaster Prevention Council, “Koremade ni Jisshisareta Chosa Ichiran [List of surveys conducted so far],” 2013, http://www.bousai.go.jp/jishin/tsunami/hinan/2/pdf/sub3.pdf (in Japanese) [accessed June 29, 2021]
12. [12] M. Nakajima, S. Kawazoe, H. Shiota, and J. Oyane, “Miyagiken Ishinomakishi ni okeru Kasetsujutaku no Seikatsu Jittai [Living Conditions in Temporary Housings in Ishinomaki-City],” J. of Rural Planning Studies, Vol.34, No.2, pp. 167-176, doi: 10.2750/arp.34.167, 2015 (in Japanese and English abstract).
13. [13] R. Uchida, “Kasetsu Jutaku Jumin no Genjo to Kongo no Tembo: Natorishi, Iwanamishi wo Jirei to site [Present status and future prospects of temporary housing residents: The case of Natori and Iwanuma city],” Shokei Gakuin Daigaku Kiyo [Bulletin of Shokei Gakuin University], Vol.66, pp. 105-118, 2013 (in Japanese).
14. [14] M. Inaba, “Kasetsu Jutaku deno Seikatsu Jokyo to ni Kansuru Ishiki Chosa [A Survey on Residents in Temporary Housing after Great East Japan Earthquake],” Tokoha Daigaku Hoiku Gakubu Kiyo [Bulletin of Faculty of Nursery Education, Tokoha University], Vol.1, pp. 131-144, 2013 (in Japanese).
15. [15] K. Mizuta, “Higashi Nihon Daishinsai Go no Fukkoukan ni Oyobosu Yoin no Kenkyu [Study on factors affecting recovery after the Great East Japan Earthquake],” Shokei Souken Onshu [Bulletin of General Research Institute of Shokei Gakuin University], Vol.2, pp. 89-98, 2020 (in Japanese).
16. [16] M. Kubo, S. Tsuchida, and T. Shizuma, “Fukushimaken ni okeru Higashinihon Daishinsai ni Tomonau Kanrenshi ni Kansuru Kento,” [A study on Disaster-related death s associated with the Great East Japan Earthquake in Fukushima Prefecture], ATOMOΣ, Vol.59, No.12, pp. 727-731, 2017 (in Japanese).
17. [17] K. Higuchi, “KH Coder,” 2021, http://khc.sourceforge.net/ [accessed on March 10, 2021]
18. [18] I. Feinerer, K. Hornik, and D. Meyer, “Text Mining Infrastructure in R,” J. of Statistical Software, Vol.25, No.5, pp. 1-54, doi: 10.18637/jss.v025.i05, 2008.
19. [19] M. Greenacre and J. Blasius (Eds.), “Correspondence analysis in the social sciences,” 1st edition, Academic Press, 1994.
20. [20] S. E. Clausen, “Applied correspondence analysis,” Chapter 1, 1st edition, Sage Publications, Inc., 1998.
21. [21] H. Oda, “Kasetsu Jutaku Gurashi wa Fuko ka? [Is livelihood in temporary housing unhappy?],” Jichitai Solution [Solution for Municipality], Vol.April-2016, p. 30, 2016 (in Japanese).
22. [22] Anonymous, Interviews by the author with an anonymous informant at Hirono Town, Hirono (Fukushima, Japan), December 8, 2020.