Understanding Risk and Risk Communication

Defining Risk

• Risk refers to the potential for harm or loss resulting from a specific event or situation
• Risk involves the likelihood of a negative outcome or event and the associated consequences
• Risk is a threat of loss, whether actual or perceived, concerning something valued
• Risk can be characterized by probability and impact

General Concerns and Issues

• Risk communication encompasses health, safety, economic, and environmental concerns
• It also includes wildlife, quality of life, legal, trust/credibility, ethical, and psychological dimensions
• Risk communication factors in historical, religious, and educational aspects
• Policy, cultural considerations, fairness/equity, and political influences are relevant
• Responsiveness and procedural issues are also considered in risk communication

Health-Related Risk Factors

• Health risks include deadly diseases like bird flu, SARS, malaria, cholera, and Ebola
• Human afflictions such as cancers, AIDS, and diabetes are considered risks
• Self-harm, including mental health issues and suicide, falls under health-related risks
• Self-induced issues like alcohol, tobacco, and obesity are also classified as risks

Natural Disasters

• Natural disasters include floods, fires, earthquakes, cyclones, volcanoes, and tsunamis
• Climate change and serious natural pollution

Human Activities

• Human activities that lead to risk include gun-related incidents (accidents, violence)
• Nuclear radiation accidents
• Accidents involving roads, seas, and air are also risks
• Risk also includes chemical spills
• The use of pesticides and environmental damage caused by companies
• Cyberattacks, hacking, and malware

Psychopathic Activities

• Terrorism (violence for political, ideological, or religious goals) is classified as raising risk
• Bio-terrorism (deliberate use of biological agents for harm)

Perceived vs. Actual Risk

• Perceived risk and actual risk often differ
• How people perceive different risks is influenced by factors which depend on knowledge or possible exposure to certain risks
• The reaction is determined based on knowledge and exposure to risk

Slovic's Psychometric Paradigm

• The degree of dread associated with a risk and the public's familiarity with a risk contribute to the psychometric paradigm

Lower Familiarity/Lower Dread

• The public views risks with lower familiarity and lower dread as rare and unlikely to be life-threatening or cause serious injuries
• Example: Rare agricultural diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease; oil terminal explosion

Lower Familiarity/Higher Dread

• The public experiences panic due to the unknown
• Example: Chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) terrorism; nuclear power plant accidents

Higher Familiarity/Lower Dread

• The public does not panic due to frequent experiences of certain risks
• Examples: Natural disasters such as earthquakes, tornados, and floods

Higher Familiarity/Higher Dread

• High familiarity/higher dread risks are life-threatening, less observable, and lack warning
• The public may have a greater understanding or awareness of these risks, and they can result in ripple effects
• Examples: IED terrorist attacks and pandemic flus

Risk Communication

• Risk communication is the process of exchanging information among interested parties about the nature, magnitude, significance, or control of a risk
• The two-way exchange of information and opinions between experts or officials and the public about potential hazards and threats
• Designed to help people grasp the risks involved, make informed decisions, and take actions to safeguard themselves and their communities (Covello, 1992)
• It bridges the gap between experts and the public, ensuring people are informed, prepared, and able to respond effectively to potential dangers
• Risk communication has similarities to an insurance policy. It is a fixed cost capable of preventing damage

Goals of Risk Communication

• Enhancement of knowledge and understanding
• Building of trust and credibility
• Encouraging appropriate attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors by providing people a sense of: hope, self- and community worth, safety, calm, and connectedness

Key Concepts of Risk Communication

• High-concern situations change the rules of communication
• The key to risk communication success is anticipation, preparation, and practice
• Most of the skills necessary are non-intuitive and non-instinctive and need to be practiced
• The key to success is preparedness

Four Types of Risk Communication

• Peter Sandman identifies four categories of risk communication classified by hazard and outrage.
• Outrage can be described as 'how upset it is likely to make people'
• Hazard can be described as 'how much harm it is likely to do'

Hazard High/Outrage Low

• The task is precaution advocacy, since the risk is objectively serious, but people are not emotionally upset enough
• The goal is to raise awareness and alert people to the serious hazard

Seven Aspects of Precautionary Advocacy

• Keep it short
• Make it interesting
• Stay on message
• Test messages
• Appeal to needs
• Appeal to emotions - especially fear
• Bring other emotions into play as well

Precautionary Communication

• People who were already worried are relieved the issue is being addressed.
• People who have too many other worries are usually apathetic and hard to reach
• People who were already too worried are usually in denial and hard to reach in a completely different way
• People who are hearing the bad news for the first time usually overreact, a temporary and useful response
• If a crisis is actually coming, pre-crisis communication has considerable upside and no downside

Hazard Low/Outrage High

• The task is Outrage Management, since the risk is objectively low, but people are emotionally upset
• The goal is to calm their fears and manage their emotional response

Hazard High/Outrage High

• The task is Crisis Communication, since the risk is both objectively serious and emotionally upsetting
• The goal is to provide support, guidance, and reassurance during a crisis

Hazard/Outrage Both Intermediate

• The task is Dialogue, which is a "sweet spot", since the risk is moderately important, and people's emotional response is in balance
• The goal is to engage in open and respectful dialogue with the community.

Risk Formula

• Risk is a combination of hazard and outrage
• Risk communication must be handled carefully because the community will become outraged as it becomes more stressed about what it perceives as unnecessarily high risk
• There is a tiny correlation between a risk's "hazard" and its "outrage"
• Knowing a risk is dangerous tells you almost nothing about whether it's upsetting; knowing it's upsetting tells you almost nothing about whether it's dangerous

Core Principles

• When people are concerned, stressed, or upset:
• They want to know you care before they care what you know
• They often focus more on the negative than on the positive
• Key role of factors such as trust, benefits, and control

How People React When Upset

• When people are upset, it impacts hearing, understanding, and remembering information
• Keep it simple

Trust Factors in High-Stress Situations

• In high-stress situations, people assess trustworthiness within the first 9-30 seconds
• Listening/caring/empathy/compassion contribute 50% to trust
• Honesty/openness and all other factors contribute 15-20%
• Competence/expertise accounts for 15-20%

Communication Barriers

• Differences in perception which impacts interpretation
• People may believe that a risk will not affect them
• There is a lack of coordination between government and public
• Governments makes risk-related decisions based on experts' opinions
• People in high-risk areas tend to have a better understanding of the risk, according to (Janmaimool and Watanabe, 2014)

Access to Information

• Access to information is a barrier. Private companies or governments may withhold information from each other or the public, making research difficult
• Due to population's lacking of a scientific background: the population may not have a strong scientific background
• Messages may contain technical terms that are confusing
• Messages often lack explaining if/how these risks will affect people, according to (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 1998)

Mass Media and Societal Characteristics

• Mass media is a barrier; reports may not accurately convey risk messages because of a lack of expertise in the hazard or risk
• Mass media is also a barrier. Media outlets may choose what information is necessary
• Cultural factors, such as language differences and religious beliefs/laws.

Communication Formats: Risk, Humanitarian, and Crisis

• Risk communication shares information about potential risks while humanitarian communication exchanges information to provide aid, humanitarian communication exchange information
• Risk communication educates and warns people about risks for emergencies- humanitarians mobilize resources and inform about assistance- crisis communication managing panic
• Disaster preparedness are examples of risk communication- Refugee support and aid coordination are humanitarian - Earthquake emergency announcements

Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication (CERC)

• CERC discusses who should be seen as the most exigent public at each stage
• CERC is split into four stages that provide a broad set of strategies and suggestions for communication (Reynolds, Galdo, & Sokler, 2002)

Four Stages of CERC

• Pre-Crisis: Communication is directed to the public and the response community regarding preparation through risk messages, warning, and guidance
• Initial event: Communication strategies for the general public and affected groups involve informing, spokespersons who are credible, and providing emergency courses of action reduce uncertainty increasing self-efficacy and reassurance.
• Maintenance: Communication targeted to the general public and affected groups through necessary background information, listening to public feedback, correcting misinformation, and empowering decision making.
• Resolution: Communication for the public and affected publics involves providing updates regarding resolution, discussing causes and new risks and reinforcing policy.

Situational Theory of Publics (STP)

• The theory supports institutions and organizations who identify with communication behaviors - such as information seeking/processing (Grunig, 2003)

Three Main Elements of the STP (Kim & Grunig, 2011)

• Problem recognition: detecting a problem with no immediate solution
• Constraint recognition: identification of perceived obstacles to finding a solution
• Level of involvement: the extent of perceived connection to the problem

Four types of publics

• Active publics
• Aware publics
• Inactive publics
• Latent publics

Heuristic-Systematic Model (HSM)

• Communicators can see and understand the connections between a person's desire for accurate and sufficient information and the motivation for processing that information (Griffin et al., 2002)
• Risk communicators can adapt messages and determine how to best present complicated information to the public

Deliberative Process Model (DPM)

• DPM guides communication development based on understanding what is required to create and sustain an atmosphere of tolerance with plural viewpoints
• Best suited for an ongoing risk issue at the recovery stage

Summary

• Identify the most exigent publics for risk messages using the CERC Model or STP
• Develop appropriate messages for the most exigent publics using the CERC Model or STP
• Understand how publics process risk messages with the STP or heuristic-systematic model
• Understand how to incorporate divergent viewpoints into risk messages using a deliberative process model
• There is no single guiding theory or model for effective risk communication
• These overarching approaches demonstrate the complexity of the relationship between a message and its impact, as well as how that message is impacted by a communicator and targeted audience