摘要:

Effective management of environmental hazards requires knowledge of both physical environmental systems and the psychosocial processes affecting responses to environmental conditions. This journal issue focuses on understanding individual and social group responses to environmental hazards. This article suggests that hazard managers and others are often perplexed by the diversity of people's conclusions about environmental hazards because they adopt an objectivist perspective, which views risk only as a physical characteristic. The constructivist perspective adopted by the social sciences holds that risk assessment reflects human judgments, which are influenced by various psychological and social factors reviewed herein. We conclude that the effective management of many environmental hazards depends on reconciliation of the objectivist and constructivist perspectives. This can be accomplished by recognizing that risk communication, the exchange of information and opinions about hazards, should integrate technical information about hazards with the interests and values of affected parties including the public, in order to develop common solutions to environmental problems.

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01942.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Western cultures are engaged in a highly contentious debate involving the identification, assessment, and management of risks to the environment and to public health and safety. Daily claims of new dangers in the food, air, and water we consume, the chemicals, energy, and substances we use, and the products, processes, and artifacts that support us are exacerbating public fears regarding environmental and health hazards. Most research on the perception and communication of risk has focused on possible harms, largely ignoring the cultural contexts in which hazards are framed and debated, and in which risk taking and risk perception occur. This article argues that, while individuals perceive risks and have concerns, it is culture that provides socially constructed myths about nature—systems of belief that are reshaped and internalized by persons, becoming part of their worldview and influencing their interpretation of natural phenomen

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01943.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

The issue of public responses to technological risks has attracted attention from social and behavioral scientists, and also from policy spokespersons. Three main viewpoints can be discerned: the public asignorant/irrational, selfish,andprudent.These three perspectives are different in their implications for policy as well as for empirical research, and it has often been easier to see the influence of policy preferences on the existing research literature than to see the influence of empirical research on policy debates. The ignorance/irrationality perspective, once widely held (particularly by policy spokespersons), has repeatedly failed to be supported by empirical research. The selfishness and prudence perspectives both change the focus fromblamingthe citizen opponents of technology to attempting tounderstandthe differences between citizens and specialists, albeit using different explanations. We argue that a more fruitful approach may be to focus on understanding the broader system that creates such conflicts in the first place, and to seek greater balance in the frames of reference used in discussions.

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01944.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Radon gas can accumulate indoors to levels that present a serious lung cancer risk. Six data sets were examined to discover what homeowners do to cope with this hazard after they have tested for radon. The best predictors of mitigation intentions proved to be global appraisals of threat plus the radon levels themselves. Translating these intentions into action, however, seemed to reflect situational obstacles rather than beliefs about radon risk, beliefs about radon mitigation, or demographic variables. Survey respondents had difficulty understanding the amount of risk posed by radon in their homes, and it appears that the observed correspondence between radon levels and mitigation responses was due almost entirely to the existence of a government‐established action guidelin

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01945.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Lay people's ability to respond to an environmental hazard is determined, in part, by their understanding of the physical, chemical, and biological processes that govern its creation and control. A general methodology is offered here for studying that understanding. It attempts to characterize people's mental models of a hazard—i.e., the sets of principles from which they generate predictions about its behavior. The organizing device for this methodology is a network representation of expert knowledge about the hazard, emphasizing concepts relevant to risk management. This methodology is illustrated here with a set of interviews about the risks of radon. The results have implications for measuring, predicting, and aiding the public's understanding of environmental hazard

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01946.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

This article summarizes many of the sources of stress that often accompany environmental threats, examines both individual and collective strategies for coping with environmental threats and the efficacy of these strategies, and discusses some of the problems with measuring coping strategies and with gauging their success. It describes collective coping strategies within the framework of social and institutional networks, and it considers why grass‐roots citizen groups are often formed as a coping strategy and what needs these organizations seem to fulfill. It presents some empirical research on individual and collective coping strategies derived from an investigation that examined residents' coping strategies in response to living near a large hazardous waste landfill. Finally, it addresses some of the social and policy implications of the ways that people cope with environmental hazard

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01947.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Decision making about environmental and public health risks has become a frequent source of social conflict in society, often resulting in major obstacles to effective risk management and disruptions in the policy process. Individuals vary not only in policy preferences and responses to environmental hazards, but also in underlying belief and value systems that influence several aspects of the environmental decision‐making process. In particular, variability in the framing of risk issues can exacerbate conflict, leading to differences in which perspectives are judged legitimate or valid, what solutions are seen as reasonable, and what type of information is seen as useful or relevant. In many controversies, groups have differed systematically in framing risk issues: as scientific or economic vs. fairness and equity questions, in terms of what at‐risk population is highlighted, and in focusing primarily on potential gain or loss as the result of a decis

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01948.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

The social experience of risk is not confined to the technical definition of risk, i.e., the product of probability and magnitude. What human beings perceive as threats to their well‐being is influenced by their values, attitudes, social influences, and cultural identity. This article introduces the framework of social amplification of risk, which integrates the technical assessment and the social experience of risk. This viewpoint proposes that events pertaining to hazards interact with psychological, social, institutional, and cultural processes in ways that can heighten or attenuate individual and social perceptions of risk and shape risk behavior. An empirical study investigated the functional relationships among five sets of variables that enter into the amplification process: physical consequences, the amount of press coverage, individual layperson perceptions, public responses, and the socioeconomic and political impacts. It found that perceptions and social responses are more strongly related to exposure to risk than to its magnitud

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01949.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

摘要:

Conflicts regarding the siting of hazardous facilities in the U.S. have often led to an impasse due to numerous problems, particularly including social distrust. To address this situation, this article proposes a multidimensional conception of trust, including cognitive, emotional, and behavioral aspects, and involving themes of expectations about others, subjective perceptions of situations, and awareness of taking risks. Four key dimensions of trust are perceptions of commitment, competence, caring, and predictability. Distrust arises from violations of expectations that people have in social relations. Research has shown a broad loss of trust in leaders and in major social institutions in the U.S. since the 1960s, together with growing public concern over health, safety, and environmental protection. These trends combine to make hazardous‐facility siting highly controversial. This article recommends key steps in risk communication and hazardous‐facility siting that are aimed at dealing as effectively as possible with social distr

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01950.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY

ISSN:0022-4537    

DOI:10.1111/j.1540-4560.1992.tb01951.x

出版商:Blackwell Publishing Ltd    

年代:1992

数据来源: WILEY