Communicating crisis uncertainty: A review of the knowledge gaps

• Crises create opportunities to demonstrate strategic public relations value.
• Yet, uncertainty inherent in crises challenges the capacity to offer sound counsel.
• Crisis definitions emphasize uncertainty.
• But, research has not tested how uncertainty affects crisis communication success.
• We offer a research synthesis and roadmap to better understand crisis uncertainty.

The communication discipline offers an abundance of guidance on what, how, and when to communicate information in crisis situations. However, there is very little direction on handling crises where this knowledge is lacking including situations with a high degree of uncertainty. Indeed, best practices in risk and crisis communication emphasize acknowledging uncertainty, and crisis definitions focus on uncertainty. Yet, empirical research on the intersection of uncertainty, crisis, and communication is lacking. The purpose of this article is to review and synthesize the limited research on communicating uncertainty in crisis contexts and relevant theory development outside of crisis research. The article concludes by proposing promising directions for future research on the intersection of uncertainty, communication, and crises.