Role Of Perceived Risk Research Articles

Coping with Long-Term Health Risks: Does Risk Perception Make a Difference?

This paper analyzes national strategies of health prevention that are aimed at tackling health risks related to infectious diseases and risky lifestyles. The particular focus lies on the role of risk perceptions in the adoption of preventive measures and on the factors that determine differences in health risk perception.

Risk Perception and Condom-use among Thai Youths: Findings from Kanchanaburi Demographic Surveillance System Site in Thailand

Youths, aged 15-24 years, comprise a large fragment of the total population in Thailand, and unsafe sexual behaviours are increasing, nowadays, among young people. The study was conducted to explore the characteristics of youths and other conducive, facilitating and reinforcing factors associated with risk perception of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) among the study population. Data employed in this study were derived from the site of the Kanchanaburi Demographic Surveillance System of Thailand 2004 using a stratified systemic design. The study population was mainly young current condom-users aged 15-24 years, and cross-sectional analysis was done on this populace. The findings revealed that youths who fell into the single (unmarried) category having temporary partners were more likely to perceive the risks associated with STIs in relation to using condom. A greater proportion of unmarried youths was engaged in sexual activity before the age of 20 years and that condom-use was also inconsistent. Youths having temporary partners were more likely to perceive risk and reason for using a condom than when with their regular partner. Education played a significant role in risk perception of STIs. Risk perception was increasing with the increasing level of education. Other conducive and facilitating factors, such as household wealth, living in urban or semi-urban areas, and access to mass media such as television, also had a positive influence on risk perception. The odds ratio showed that condom-users who had indulgence in liquor were less likely to perceive the risk of STIs. Overall, socioeconomic status had a great influence on risk perception of STIs. Finally, youths exhibiting high-risk sexual behaviour need realistic risk assessments and positive ways of incorporating condom into their sexual lives.

The role of risk perceptions in the risk mitigation process: The case of wildfire in high risk communities

An important policy question receiving considerable attention concerns the risk perception–risk mitigation process that guides how individuals choose to address natural hazard risks. This question is considered in the context of wildfire. We analyze the factors that influence risk reduction behaviors by homeowners living in the wildland–urban interface. The factors considered are direct experience, knowledge of wildfire risk, locus of responsibility, fulltime/seasonal status, and self-efficacy. Survey data from three homeowner associations in the western U.S. are used to estimate the direct and indirect effects of this relationship. Our results indicate that the effects of knowledge and locus of responsibility are mediated by homeowners' risk perceptions. We also find that beliefs of self-efficacy and fulltime/seasonal status have a direct influence on risk reduction behaviors. Finally, we find, surprisingly, that direct experience with wildfire does not directly influence the risk perception–risk mitigation process.

Risk Theory and 'Subjective Fear': The Role of Risk Perception, Assessment, and Management in Refugee Status Determinations

Adjudicators deciding refugee claims often assume that people in danger will take prompt and effective steps to save themselves and will never willingly put themselves at risk. They rely on three articles of faith handed down by generations of judges: those who fear for their lives in their homelands will not delay in leaving; they will ask for protection immediately in the first safe country that they reach; and they will never return for any reason. These assumptions are not based on any evidence, and yet evidence is close at hand. For decades, psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, economists and historians have studied how human beings perceive and respond to danger. This article reviews this research and concludes that before adjudicators could even potentially infer from these types of actions that a claimant was not afraid, or is lying, they must consider the psychological and cultural factors influencing the claimant's risk perception, assessment, and management. It concludes that even when all these factors are taken into account, the well-documented variance in human response to danger makes ‘subjective fear’ judgments fundamentally unsound.

CONFORMITY FOR LEGITIMACY: A PERSPECTIVE FROM THE LEARNING MODEL OF FIRM RISK-TAKING.

This article discusses companies that do not fit the model of conformity in the neo-institutional analysis of their operations. The role of risk perception in the evaluation of non-conformist behavior is analysed. This tendency is investigated in the context of the venture capital markets. The hypotheses presented suggest that the risk taking behavior is negatively related its financial status, but this tendency is dependent on the level of status that it holds. The relationship between status, risk and firm performance among venture capital investors is explored.

Changing Climate in Protected Areas? Risk Perception of Climate Change by Biosphere Reserve Managers

Since protected areas (PAs) comprise about twelve percent of the world's surface, PA managers are in a key position regarding in situ biodiversity conservation against the background of emerging climate change. PAs can exemplify progress in climate change mitigation and adaptation. What role do PA managers – and their risk perception and response – play in this context? A global survey with biosphere reserve (BR) managers investigated this issue using a combined quantitative and qualitative approach. Results suggest that climate change risk perception is largely linked to economic power: in non-high-income countries climate change was perceived as being significantly less relevant than in high-income countries. In non-high-income countries, other threats such as illegal activities are regarded as being much more important than climate change impacts. Thus, socio-political factors and the connection between management and science seem to play an important role in risk perception of BR managers. In situ biodiversity conservation efforts with regard to climate change mitigation and adaptation must inform BR managers about likely climate change impacts, involve them in transdisciplinary research activities, and speed up necessary mitigation and adaptation measures.

Emotions and Risk Perception

The role of emotions in risk perception has been held to be important, based mainly on findings in applications of the Psychometric Model and the notion of an “Affect heuristic”. These conclusions are criticized because the work on “Dread” in the tradition of the Psychometric Model has been based mainly on items measuring severity of consequences. Only one emotion item was included. Furthermore, “affect” is a word denoting emotions but in the concrete applications to the “affect heuristic” studies have been made not of emotions, but of attitudes and evaluations. In the present paper, actual data on emotions are investigated and it is found that emotions do indeed play an important role in risk perception and related attitudes. In one study, it was found that interest in a hazard (a positive emotion) was positively correlated with perceived risk. Interest was an important explanatory factor in models of demand for risk mitigation. Much recent work on emotions and attitudes suggests a three-step process, where initial cognitive processing gives rise to emotions, which in turn guide the further, more elaborate, cognitive processing. The notion of the primacy of a primitive initial emotional reaction governing belief contents is rejected. Risk communication based on such a simplistic neurophysiological model is likely to fail.

The future of global warming: will it be emissions control or environmental damages?

This paper explores the role of risk perceptions in influencing public policy related to global warming. It solves for the optimal paths for emissions, abatement and investment in pollution-eliminating research by incorporating perceived risks into public decision making. It also compares the impact of differential risk perceptions on international collaboration on carbon abatement. Key findings are that the perception of risks related to environmental damages and technological breakthroughs plays an important role in determining the level of mitigation efforts. A high level of perceived risk of environmental damages discourages investment in pollution-eliminating research as there are few benefits from eliminating pollution after damages are realized. Other options that allow for sequestering carbon from the atmosphere may still remain viable. Another key finding is that when it comes to effort sharing between nations, differential mitigation efforts are primarily caused due to the differences in abatement technology, benefits from emissions and research capabilities. However, such differences could be accentuated or mitigated depending upon the differences in risk perception of developed and developing countries.

Mediating the social and psychological impacts of terrorist attacks: The role of risk perception and risk communication

The public's understanding of chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) related issues and their likely actions following a CBRN incident is an issue of great concern, as public psychological and behavioural responses will help determine subsequent morbidity and mortality rates. This paper explores the role of effective government communication with the public and its role in mediating the social and psychological impact of terrorist attacks. We examine the importance of effective communication in reducing morbidity and mortality in the event of a terrorist attack and explore the impact of risk perceptions in determining the success or failure of risk communication strategies. This includes the examination of the role of fear as a health risk, and the identification of factors relevant to public trust in risk communication. Finally, an investigation of the type of information desired by members of the public leads the authors to make risk communication recommendations targeted at the promotion of more adaptive behaviours in response to CBRN attacks

Responding to global infectious disease outbreaks: Lessons from SARS on the role of risk perception, communication and management

With increased globalisation comes the likelihood that infectious disease appearing in one country will spread rapidly to another, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) being a recent example. However, although SARS infected some 10,000 individuals, killing around 1000, it did not lead to the devastating health impact that many feared, but a rather disproportionate economic impact. The disproportionate scale and nature of this impact has caused concern that outbreaks of more serious disease could cause catastrophic impacts on the global economy. Understanding factors that led to the impact of SARS might help to deal with the possible impact and management of such other infectious disease outbreaks. In this respect, the role of risk—its perception, communication and management—is critical. This paper looks at the role that risk, and especially the perception of risk, its communication and management, played in driving the economic impact of SARS. It considers the public and public health response to SARS, the role of the media and official organisations, and proposes policy and research priorities for establishing a system to better deal with the next global infectious disease outbreak. It is concluded that the potential for the rapid spread of infectious disease is not necessarily a greater threat than it has always been, but the effect that an outbreak can have on the economy is, which requires further research and policy development.

The Role of the Affect and Availability Heuristics in Risk Communication

Results of past research suggest that affect plays an important role in risk perception. Because affect may also increase the availability of risks, affect and availability are closely related concepts. Three studies tested the hypothesis that evoking negative affect (fear), either through past experience or through experimental manipulation, results in greater perceived risk. The present research focused on perception of flooding risk. Study 1 and Study 2 showed that participants who received risk information concerning a longer time period (e.g., 30 years) perceived more danger compared with participants who received risk information for one year. Study 2 showed that the interpretation of risk information was influenced by participants' own experiences with flooding. In Study 3, affect was experimentally manipulated. After looking at photographs depicting houses in a flooded region, participants perceived greater risk compared with participants in a control group. Taken together, the results of these three studies suggest that affect is important for successful risk communication. Results of the present research are in line with the affect heuristic proposed by Slovic and colleagues.

Hearing protection use in industry: The role of risk perception

Scientific literature on high-noise exposure effects is very extensive. Therefore, health and safety practitioners are aware of those effects and they know, very often, how to avoid it. However, workers exposed to high-noise levels often ignore the consequences of such exposure, or at least, their extension. Despite all advances in the study of occupational noise mitigation, the individual perception analysis and its implications on workers’ behaviour, such as the use of Hearing Protection Devices (HPD), has been a minor research area. Some previous studies have concluded that individual perception, as well as contextual factors, are important predictors of safety behaviour, including the use of HPD. The present study comprises a sample of 434 industrial workers exposed to noise pressure levels greater than the action level defined in Portuguese legislation (85 dB(A)) and it aims at analysing the associations between some particular aspects of individual risk perception of noise exposure and the HPD use, as well as identifying the main factors influencing individual’s risk perception. For this purpose, and considering the literature review, it was developed a questionnaire to assess workers risk perception of high-noise exposure and their HPD use profile. The multivariate data analysis of the several variables considered revealed that risk perception plays a significant role as a predictor of workers’ behaviour, namely in what concerns the use of HPD. Furthermore, these results do suggest that risk perception should be considered as an essential issue in the design and implementation of any Hearing Conservation Program.

Psychological distress in women at increased risk for breast cancer: the role of risk perception

The magnetic resonance imaging screening (MRISC) study evaluates a surveillance programme for women with a hereditary risk for breast cancer. The psychological burden of surveillance in these women may depend on inaccurate risk perceptions. To examine differences in risk perceptions between three predefined risk categories and associations with psychological distress. BC-specific distress, general distress, and RP (cognitive and affective) were assessed, two months before a surveillance appointment. Cumulative lifetime risk (CLTR) of developing breast cancer was trichotomised into: (1) CLTR of 60–85% (mutation carriers), (2) CLTR of 30–50%, and (3) CLTR of 15–30%. In a total group of 351 women (mean age 40.5 years, range 21–63 years) the three risk categories significantly differed in their accuracy of assessing cognitive risk perceptions. In category 1, 60% had an accurate risk perceptions, in category 2, 43.7% and in category 3, 33.3%. Overestimators reported significantly more breast cancer-specific distress. After adding affective risk perception to the model, this effect disappeared. Affective risk perceptions showed significant associations with breast cancer-specific and general distress. Affective risk perception is a more important determinant for psychological distress than cognitive risk perception. This knowledge should be used during surveillance appointments in order to improve and individualise support for these women.

Current research promises and challenges in behavioral oncology: report from the American Society of Preventive Oncology annual meeting, 2002.

The Behavioral Oncology Interest Group of the American Society of Preventive Oncology held a Roundtable session on March 10, 2002, at the American Society of Preventive Oncology annual meeting in Bethesda, Maryland, to discuss the current state-of-the-science in behavioral approaches to cancer prevention and control and to delineate priorities for additional research. Four key areas were considered: (a) behavioral approaches to cancer genetic risk assessment and testing; (b) biological mechanisms of psychosocial effects on cancer; (c) the role of risk perceptions in cancer screening adherence; and (d) the impact of tailored and targeted interventions on cancer prevention and control research. The evidence reviewed indicates that behavioral approaches have made significant contributions to cancer prevention and control research. At the same time, there is a need to more closely link future investigations to the underlying base of behavioral science principles and paradigms that guide them. To successfully bridge the gap between the availability of effective new cancer prevention and control technologies and the participants they are meant to serve will require the development of more integrative conceptual models, the incorporation of more rigorous methodological designs, and more precise identification of the individual and group characteristics of the groups under study.

Human and organizational factors in offshore safety

The role of human and organizational factors in predicting accidents and incidents has become of major interest to the UK offshore oil and gas industry. Some of these factors had been measured in an earlier study focusing on the role of risk perception in determining accident involvement. The current study sought to extend the methodology by focusing on perceptions of organizational factors that could have an impact on safety. A self-report questionnaire was developed and distributed to 11 installations operating on the UK Continental Shelf. A total of 722 were returned (33% response rate) from a representative sample of the offshore workforce on these installations. The study investigated the underlying structure and content of offshore employees' attitudes to safety, feelings of safety and satisfaction with safety measures. Correlations and step-wise regression analysis were used to test the relationships between measures. The results suggest that 'unsafe' behaviour is the 'best' predictor of accidents/near misses as measured by self-report data and that unsafe behaviour is, in turn, driven by perceptions of pressure for production.

Risk perception, personality factors and alcohol use among adolescents

The role of risk perceptions and personality in adolescents' participation in alcohol-related risk taking was investigated using structural equation modeling techniques. High-school students (N=323) reported on their level of participation in alcohol-related and other forms of risky activities and rated these activities on nine risk-perception scales. Their levels of sensation seeking, ego control, achievement and independence were also assessed. Structural equation modeling indicated that perceived benefits vs risks, grade level, and independence were directly associated with participation in alcohol-related activities. Sensation seeking, ego control, achievement and independence were indirectly associated with alcohol-related activities through perceived benefits vs risks. The implications of risk perceptions as proximal predictors of adolescent alcohol-related risk taking are discussed.

The Cancer Risk Communication Meeting in Perspective

The National Research Council (1) defined risk communication as an interactive process of exchange of information and opinion among individuals, groups, and institutions. It involves multiple messages about the nature of risk and other messages, not strictly about risk, that express concerns, opinions, or reactions to risk messages or to legal and institutional arrangements for risk management. When applied to cancer, this is a useful working definition of risk communication. Cancer risk communication is a vital topic for many groups, including the media, health care professionals, researchers, and, of course, the public. Media professionals are faced daily with the need to communicate risk. Nowhere were the challenges and repercussions of cancer risk communication more apparent than when we have attempted to communicate the lifetime risk for breast cancer (the well-known one-in-eight number). As Bunker et al. (2) recently stated, people do not understand the idea of lifetime risk. They also do not understand that the average risk is modified by a number of individual factors, such as age and family history of cancer. This points out one of the important problems in communicating cancer risk information. People have trouble understanding numbers, especially when the numbers are probabilities. But perhaps even harder is communicating the concept of competing risks. For example, women focus so much on breast cancer risks that they underestimate the risks of heart disease and lung cancer. Risk communication may be made harder by the influence of certain advertisers (e.g., tobacco companies). A survey by the American Council on Science and Health (3) showed that the risks of smoking tend to be downplayed in women’s magazines. The survey found that articles on tobacco represented fewer than 1% of all health-related articles. No wonder people have problems perceiving tobacco-related risks correctly. Recently, Nelkin (4) argued, “The media response to research reports about health risks suggests that efforts to reach the public must consider the important differences between lay and professional understanding of certain concepts. To scientists, evidence is a statistical concept, and the focus is on aggregate data. But to laypersons—and many journalists—anecdotal information and individual cases are also compelling evidence. The media focus is on the immediate concerns of readers. Will I be harmed?” Balancing these different perspectives about scientific evidence is an important challenge of cancer risk communication. Researchers are grappling with a number of important questions related to cancer risk communication, including the following: What is the role of risk perceptions in cancer-related behaviors? What effects do risk communications have on decision making and behavior? How do we communicate risk in numbers, words, and graphics? Practitioners are faced with patients who may want to know their own risk of breast cancer and what they can do about it. Other patients (e.g., those who smoke) may want to avoid discussion of risk. And, of course, the possibility of testing for genetic susceptibility to cancer raises many other patient questions about risk. This meeting was designed with the ambitious goal of trying to bridge the communication perspectives of researchers, the media, and practitioners. We planned to emerge with a clearer understanding of what we know about cancer risk communication and what we need to know to bridge what often seems like a chasm between research and practice. That is why we asked the participants to focus on the two questions: 1) What do we know? 2) What do we need to know about cancer risk communication? The importance of this topic was highlighted in a recent report by the Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council (5) that dealt with recommendations for people exposed to iodine-131. The committee suggested that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) consider funding research to develop a better understanding of how people perceive the benefits and harms of cancer screening and how those perceptions are affected by different ways of presenting quantitative information and different ways of structuring patient–clinician communication. They emphasized that DHHS would be well served by efforts to understand better how individuals make judgments about risk situations and, more specifically, how they use information to do so. This is a useful statement of research needs for the broader field of cancer risk communication as well as the specific case of iodine131. This meeting of some of the United States’ leading researchers and communicators represents an important opportunity to advance both the research and the practice agendas related to cancer risk communication. Our goals, after all, are more similar than different—to improve the communication and comprehension of cancer risk.

Risk Perception during Information System Development in Non-Profit Health Care Organizations

The perception of risk exposure among design team members during the early phases of information system development projects can provide valuable strategic information for clinical organizations. To develop a typology of perceived risks during information system development projects in health care, interviews were performed with key team members from a specialist clinic, primary health care, and an informatics research group, during the requirements specification. Phenomenological data analysis and secondary integration of the results in available theories were performed. System objectives, the user requirements definition procedure, the communication pattern between design team members and project management were found to be perceived as the main risk areas. In the secondary analysis, the technical factors, identified as preventing a maximization of the use of the resources, were lack of informatics knowledge among economic decision makers and differences between customers and suppliers regarding their views on the nature of system design. During the implementation of a given strategy, decision makers may consider the requests of their own sponsors in the first place and maximize the use of the project resources in the second place. Informatics knowledge plays a key role in risk perception during the development of an information system in health care. Political considerations by team members are important to take into regard, since these may influence technical and economic decisions.

The role of risk perception and technical information in scientific debates over nuclear waste storage

This article examines how members of the lay public factor risk perceptions, trust and technical information from differing scientific sources into policy judgements about potentially hazardous facilities. Focusing on radwaste storage repositories, we examine how members of the public filter new information about potential hazards through risk perceptions, and adjust their own beliefs about risks in light of that information. Scientists play a large (and increasing) role in public policy debates concerning nuclear waste issues, in which public perceptions of human health and environmental risks often differ substantially from scientific consensus about those risks. Public concerns and uncertainties are compounded when scientists from competing groups (government agencies, scientific institutions, industries, and interest groups) make different claims about the likely health and environmental consequences of different policy options. We show the processes by which the public receive and process scientific information about nuclear waste management risks using data taken from interviews with 1800 randomly selected individuals (1200 in New Mexico, and 600 nationwide). Among the more important findings are: (1) members of the public are able to make quite reasonable estimates about what kinds of positions on the risks of nuclear waste disposal will be taken by scientists from differing organizations (e.g. scientists from environmental groups, government agencies, or the nuclear industry); (2) in assessing the credibility of scientific claims, members of the public place great emphasis on the independence of the scientists from those who fund the research; and (3) prior expectations about the positions (or expected biases) of scientists from different organizations substantially affects the ways in which members of the public weigh (and utilize) information that comes from these scientists.

The role of risk perception and efficacy cognitions in the prediction of HIV-related preventive behavior and condom use.

The salience of the Protection Motivation Theory to HIV preventive behavior was investigated in a sample of 468 heterosexual men 20-45 years of age recruited in Germany and at vacation spots in Spain. This theory conceptualizes self-protective behaviors as a function of the severity of the threat, perceived personal vulnerability to this threat, the availability of coping responses, and the effectiveness of these responses. Cognitive variables measured included perceived severity of the threat of AIDS, sexual self-efficacy expectancy, self-efficacy expectations in terms of sexual communication skills, response efficacy, and attitude toward condom use. On a scale of 1 (low) to 6 (high), perceived severity of the AIDS threat averaged 5.3, individual susceptibility ratings averaged 3.5, and susceptibility of peers had a mean of 4.9. Although 33% of respondents had made behavioral changes in response to the AIDS epidemic, only 15% always used condoms while 12% used them occasionally. Self-efficacy expectancy with regard to assertiveness and use of preventive measures emerged as the most significant predictor of HIV-related behaviors. The causal analyses indicated that high communicative self-efficacy expectancy is associated with high-risk sexual behaviors, while self-efficacy expectancy regarding assertiveness and the use of preventive measures promotes risk reduction. These associations were strongest in men over 26 years of age, singles, and tourists. These findings suggest a need for interventions for couples such as assertiveness training and guidance on communicating about sex and AIDS. Also demonstrated was the need for AIDS education programs to identify where participants are in terms of perceiving the threat of and coping with the AIDS epidemic and promote conditions that will help people advance to the next stage.