Taxonomic Analysis of Perceived Risk: Modeling Individual and Group Perceptions Within Homogeneous Hazard Domains

Previous studies of risk perception have typically focused on the mean judgments of a group of people regarding the riskiness (or safety) of a diverse set of hazardous activities, substances, and technologies. This paper reports the results of two studies that take a different path. Study 1 investigated whether models within a single technological domain were similar to previous models based on group means and diverse hazards. Study 2 created a group taxonomy of perceived risk for only one technological domain, railroads, and examined whether the structure of that taxonomy corresponded with taxonomies derived from prior studies of diverse hazards. Results from Study 1 indicated that the importance of various risk characteristics in determining perceived risk differed across individuals and across hazards, but not so much as to invalidate the results of earlier studies based on group means and diverse hazards. In Study 2, the detailed analysis of railroad hazards produced a structure that had both important similarities to, and dissimilarities from, the structure obtained in prior research with diverse hazard domains. The data also indicated that railroad hazards are really quite diverse, with some approaching nuclear reactors in their perceived seriousness. These results suggest that information about the diversity of perceptions within a single domain of hazards could provide valuable input to risk-management decisions.     

Perception of Hazards: The Role of Social Trust and Knowledge

Recent research indicates that social trust of those who manage a hazard is strongly correlated to judgments about the hazard's risk and benefits. The present study investigates the more specific question of “For which hazards is this?” It was postulated that when an individual lacks knowledge about a hazard, social trust of authorities managing the hazard determines perceived risks and benefits. On the other hand, when an individual has personal knowledge about a hazard and therefore does not need to rely on managing authorities, social trust is unrelated to judged risks and benefits. Participants (N = 91) assessed risks, benefits, and trust in managing authorities and personal knowledge associated with 25 hazardous technologies and activities. As expected, strong correlations between social trust and judged risks and benefits were observed for hazards about which people did not possess much knowledge. No significant correlations between social trust and judged risks and benefits were found for hazards about which people were knowledgeable. Results suggest that the lay public relies on social trust when making judgments of risks and benefits when personal knowledge about a hazard is lacking. Replicating findings of other studies, the present study also found negative correlations between perceived risks and perceived benefits. When social trust was controlled for, correlations between perceived risks and benefits diminished. Implications of the results for risk management are discussed.     

移动电子商务下交易成本影响消费者感知价值的实证研究

在分析了移动电子商务下交易成本的主要构成后,论文提出了搜寻成本、评价成本、支付成本、风险成本对消费者感知价值影响的假设,构建了移动电子商务下交易成本对消费者感知价值影响的假设模型,采用结构方程模型方法利用样本数据对假设模型进行了拟合检验。研究结果表明,风险成本、支付成本、评价成本是移动电子商务下消费者网上购买商品的主要成本,均与消费者感知价值显著负相关,其中,风险成本与消费者感知价值相关程度最高,而搜寻成本对消费者感知价值的影响并不显著。此外,购物者的风险态度与其风险成本、评价成本显著正相关,通过对评价成本、风险成本的作用间接影响消费者感知价值。最后,依据研究结果,论文提出了促进我国移动电子商务发展的建议。     

Risk Perception,Experience, and Objective Risk: A Cross‐National Study with European Emergency Survivors

Understanding public risk perceptions and their underlying processes is important in order to learn more about the way people interpret and respond to hazardous emergency events. Direct experience with an involuntary hazard has been found to heighten the perceived risk of experiencing the same hazard and its consequences in the future, but it remains unclear if cross‐over effects are possible (i.e., experience with one hazard influencing perceived risk for other hazards also). Furthermore, the impact of objective risk and country of residence on perceived risk is not well understood. As part of the BeSeCu (Behavior, Security, and Culture) Project, a sample of 1,045 survivors of emergencies from seven European countries (i.e., Germany, the Czech Republic, Poland, Sweden, Spain, Turkey, and Italy) was drawn. Results revealed heightened perceived risk for emergency events (i.e., domestic and public fires, earthquakes, floods, and terrorist attacks) when the event had been experienced previously plus some evidence of cross‐over effects, although these effects were not so strong. The largest country differences in perceived risk were observed for earthquakes, but this effect was significantly reduced by taking into account the objective earthquake risk. For fires, floods, terrorist attacks, and traffic accidents, only small country differences in perceived risk were found. Further studies including a larger number of countries are welcomed.     

Demographic Influences on Risk Perceptions

Over the past 15 years, psychologists have empirically investigated how people perceive technological, consumer, and natural hazards. The psychometric-attitudes to risk being summarized by three factors: "dread," whether the risk is known, and personal exposure to the risk. The results have been used to suggest that certain types of hazards are viewed very differently from other hazards. The purpose of this paper is somewhat different, in that it investigates whether individual demographic characteristics influence psychometric perceptions of risk. This paper makes use of a large, professionally conducted, survey of a wide cross-section of the residents of metropolitan Chicago. One thousand adults were interviewed in a random-digit dial telephone survey, producing a useable dataset of about 800. Data on the three risk factors mentioned above were obtained on 7-point scales for four common hazards: aviation accidents, fires in the home, automobile accidents, and stomach cancer. The survey also collected demographic data on respondents'age, schooling, income, sex, and race. Regressions were then conducted to relate the demographic characteristics to risk perceptions. Some strong general conclusions can be drawn. The results suggest that women, people with lower levels of schooling and income, younger people, and blacks have more dread of hazards. The exception being age-related illnesses which, not unnaturally, are feared by older people. Unlike previous literature, we cannot substantiate the argument that these groups of people are less informed about hazards and thus less accepting of them. The most likely leading explanation of the relationship between demographic factors and dread of a hazard is the perceived personal exposure to the hazard. People with greater perceived exposure to a hazard are more fearful.     

Perception and Acceptance of Technological and Environmental Risks: Why Are Poor Countries Less Concerned?

The research has been aimed at answering two questions: (1) What factors impact perception and acceptance of technological and environmental hazards? (2) Why are rich societies involved more in protecting their environment and health than poor societies? Data has been collected from representative samples of two countries—Poland and Sweden. The results indicate that (1) contrary to earlier findings, the inverse relations between perceived benefits and dangers of hazards has not been observed, (2) acceptance of a risk has been mostly influenced by perceived benefits, (3) rejection of a risk has been mostly influenced by its perceived harmful consequences. Concerning the second question, it has been found that: (1) perceived hazard's danger and benefit is not the only factor that impacts its acceptance, and (2) a broader economic context can impact acceptance (tolerance) of hazards. It has been found that being aware of high dangers and not very high benefits of hazardous activities, Poles still have accepted them. Thus, Poles seem to follow an old proverb: “When one does not have what one likes, one has to like what one has.”     

Risk Perception and the Value of Safety

This paper examines the relationship between perceived risk and willingness-to-pay (WTP) for increased safety from technological hazards in both conceptual and empirical terms. A conceptual model is developed in which a given household's WTP for risk reductions is a function of traditional socioeconomic variables (i.e., income and base level of risk) and perceived characteristics of the hazards (i.e., dread, knowledge, and exposure). Data to estimate the model are obtained through a combined contingent valuation and risk perception survey that considers 10 technological hazards, five of which are well-defined (e.g., death rates are known and the risks are relatively common) and five are less well-defined. Econometric results, using TOBIT estimation procedures, support the importance of both types of variables in explaining WTP across all 10 hazards. When the risks are split into two groups, the results show that WTP for well-defined hazards is most influenced by perceived personal exposure, while WTP for less well-defined risks is most influenced by levels of dread and severity.     

Risk Perception of the "Mad Cow Disease" in France: Determinants and Consequences

Since 1996, when bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) was assessed as a possible human transmissible disease, a variant of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), French people have entered into a long period of fear and avoidance of beef and bovine byproducts, which produced an unprecedented collapse in the beef market. This article deals with the perceived risk of the "mad cow disease" (MCD) in the French general population. Two surveys were conducted on a representative sample of the adult population, the first one in 2000 during the peak of the crisis and the second one 13 months later in a quieter period. The main assumption we made was that changes in beef consumption are strongly related to the perceived risk of MCD, which we defined as people's cognitive and affective responses to hazard. Our objective was to identify the determinants and consequences of this perceived risk and to compare them in different sociopolitical contexts. The results issued from a bivariate and multivariate analysis show that: (i) the distribution of most of the variables significantly related to the perceived risk identified in the first survey had changed in the second survey, in relation with the reduction of worry and the resumption of national beef consumption; (ii) the propensity for self-protection through avoiding or ceasing beef eating was more related to feelings of worry than to subjective vCJD risk assessments; and (iii) the main determinant of less avoidance to beef products was the preference for beef, a feeling identified prior to emergence of the risk of MCD, remaining unchanged in various contexts.     

Perceived Risks of Conventional and Organic Produce: Pesticides, Pathogens, and Natural Toxins

Public risk perceptions and demand for safer food are important factors shaping agricultural production practices in the United States. Despite documented food safety concerns, little attempt has been made to elicit consumers' subjective risk judgments for a range of food safety hazards or to identify factors most predictive of perceived food safety risks. In this study, over 700 conventional and organic fresh produce buyers in the Boston area were surveyed for their perceived food safety risks. Survey results showed that consumers perceived relatively high risks associated with the consumption and production of conventionally grown produce compared with other public health hazards. For example, conventional and organic food buyers estimated the median annual fatality rate due to pesticide residues on conventionally grown food to be about 50 per million and 200 per million, respectively, which is similar in magnitude to the annual mortality risk from motor vehicle accidents in the United States. Over 90% of survey respondents also perceived a reduction in pesticide residue risk associated with substituting organically grown produce for conventionally grown produce, and nearly 50% perceived a risk reduction due to natural toxins and microbial pathogens. Multiple regression analyses indicate that only a few factors are consistently predictive of higher risk perceptions, including feelings of distrust toward regulatory agencies and the safety of the food supply. A variety of factors were found to be significant predictors of specific categories of food hazards, suggesting that consumers may view food safety risks as dissimilar from one another. Based on study findings, it is recommended that future agricultural policies and risk communication efforts utilize a comparative risk approach that targets a range of food safety hazards.     

Intended Message Versus Message Received in Hypothetical Physician Risk Communications: Exploring the Gap

We examined the risk perception that is derived from hypothetical physician risk communications. Subjects (n= 217) completed a questionnaire on the Web for $3. Subjects were presented with four hypothetical cancer risk scenarios that included a physician risk communication in one of three risk communication formats: verbal only, verbal plus numeric probability as a percent, and verbal plus numeric probability as a fraction. In each scenario, subjects were asked to imagine themselves as the patient described and to state their perceived personal susceptibility to the cancer (i.e., risk perception) on a 0 to 100 scale, as well as responses to other measures. Subjects' risk perceptions were highly variable, spanning nearly the entire probability scale for each scenario, and the degree of variation was only slightly less in the risk communication formats in which a numeric statement of risk was provided. Subjects were more likely to overestimate than underestimate their risk relative to the stated risk in the numeric versions, and overestimation was associated with the belief that the physician minimized the risk so they wouldn't worry, innumeracy, and worry, as well as decisions about testing for the cancer. These results demonstrate significant gaps between the intended message and the message received in physician risk communications. Implications for medical decisions, patient distress, and future research are discussed.     

Interactive Hazards Education Program for Youth in a Low SES Community: A Quasi‐Experimental Pilot Study

A pilot study of an interactive hazards education program was carried out in Canberra (Australia), with direct input from youth participants. Effects were evaluated in relation to youths’ interest in disasters, motivation to prepare, risk awareness, knowledge indicators, perceived preparedness levels, planning and practice for emergencies, and fear and anxiety indicators. Parents also provided ratings, including of actual home‐based preparedness activities. Using a single group pretest‐posttest with benchmarking design, a sample of 20 youths and their parents from a low SES community participated. Findings indicated beneficial changes on a number of indicators. Preparedness indicators increased significantly from pre‐ to posttest on both youth (p < 0.01) and parent ratings (p < 0.01). Parent ratings reflected an increase of just under six home‐based preparedness activities. Youth knowledge about disaster mitigation also was seen to increase significantly (p < 0.001), increasing 39% from pretest levels. While personalized risk perceptions significantly increased (p < 0.01), anxiety and worry levels were seen either not to change (generalized anxiety, p > 0.05) or to reduce between pre‐ and posttest (hazards‐specific fears, worry, and distress, ps ranged from p < 0.05 to < 0.001). In terms of predictors of preparedness, a number of variables were found to predict posttest preparedness levels, including information searching done by participants between education sessions. These pilot findings are the first to reflect quasi‐experimental outcomes for a youth hazards education program carried out in a setting other than a school that focused on a sample of youth from a low SES community.     

Accidents and Unpleasant Incidents: Worry in Transport and Prediction of Travel Behavior

Worry on nine different means of transport was measured in a Norwegian sample of 853 respondents. The main aim of the study was to investigate differences in worry about accidents and worry about unpleasant incidents, and how these two sorts of worry relate to various means of transport as well as transport behavior. Factor analyses of worry about accidents suggested a division between rail transport, road transport, and nonmotorized transport, whereas analyses of worry about unpleasant incidents suggested a division between transport modes where you interact with other people and "private" transport modes. Moreover, mean ratings of worry showed that respondents worried more about accidents than unpleasant incidents on private transport modes, and more about unpleasant incidents than accidents on public transport modes. Support for the distinction between worry about accidents and unpleasant incidents was also found when investigating relationships between both types of worry and behavioral adaptations: worry about accidents was more important than worry about unpleasant incidents in relation to behavioral adaptations on private means of transport, whereas the opposite was true for public means of transport. Finally, predictors of worry were investigated. The models of worry about accidents and worry about unpleasant incidents differed as to what predictors turned out significant. Knowledge about peoples' worries on different means of transport is important with regard to understanding and influencing transport and travel behavior, as well as attending to commuters' welfare.     

Developing a Broadly Applicable Measure of Risk Perception

Decades of research identify risk perception as a largely intuitive and affective construct, in contrast to the more deliberative assessments of probability and consequences that form the foundation of risk assessment. However, a review of the literature reveals that many of the risk perception measures employed in survey research with human subjects are either generic in nature, not capturing any particular affective, probabilistic, or consequential dimension of risk; or focused solely on judgments of probability. The goal of this research was to assess a multidimensional measure of risk perception across multiple hazards to identify a measure that will be broadly useful for assessing perceived risk moving forward. Our results support the idea of risk perception being multidimensional, but largely a function of individual affective reactions to the hazard. We also find that our measure of risk perception holds across multiple types of hazards, ranging from those that are behavioral in nature (e.g., health and safety behaviors), to those that are technological (e.g., pollution), or natural (e.g., extreme weather). We suggest that a general, unidimensional measure of risk may accurately capture one's perception of the severity of the consequences, and the discrete emotions that are felt in response to those potential consequences. However, such a measure is not likely to capture the perceived probability of experiencing the outcomes, nor will it be as useful at understanding one's motivation to take mitigation action.     

The Dynamics of Risk Perception: How Does Perceived Risk Respond to Risk Events?

This paper examines the relationship between perceived risk and experience. This research addresses the processes by which people learn about risk and choose among real life prospects with associated uncertainties, risks and benefits. By comparing the impact of acute risk events with that of chronic risk events on public perception of risk during and after the events, this research focuses on the learning processes that characterize what kinds of risk events alter the perception of risk. Comparing materialized hazards at existing facilities with the risks associated with potential facilities, this research addresses risk choices among real life prospects. This study uses a classic pre-post quasi-experimental design. Surveys conducted in the Spring of 1992 on perceived and acceptable risk in Odessa and La Porte, Texas were conducted prior to risk events. Respondents from that survey were re-interviewed in the Spring of 1993 after the risk events to form a panel design. This paper analyzes the affect of risk events on perceived risk and the implications of these experiences for public policy concerning technological risk. The empirical results suggest that the social processes that construct and maintain risk in the public eye are at least as important as, if not more important than, the physical and psychological dimensions of risk.     

The influence of mapped hazards on risk beliefs: a proximity-based modeling approach

Interview findings suggest perceived proximity to mapped hazards influences risk beliefs when people view environmental hazard maps. For dot maps, four attributes of mapped hazards influenced beliefs: hazard value, proximity, prevalence, and dot patterns. In order to quantify the collective influence of these attributes for viewers’ perceived or actual map locations, we present a model to estimate proximity‐based hazard or risk (PBH) and share study results that indicate how modeled PBH and map attributes influenced risk beliefs. The randomized survey study among 447 university students assessed risk beliefs for 24 dot maps that systematically varied by the four attributes. Maps depicted water test results for a fictitious hazardous substance in private residential wells and included a designated “you live here” location. Of the nine variables that assessed risk beliefs, the numerical susceptibility variable was most consistently and strongly related to map attributes and PBH. Hazard value, location in or out of a clustered dot pattern, and distance had the largest effects on susceptibility. Sometimes, hazard value interacted with other attributes, for example, distance had stronger effects on susceptibility for larger than smaller hazard values. For all combined maps, PBH explained about the same amount of variance in susceptibility as did attributes. Modeled PBH may have utility for studying the influence of proximity to mapped hazards on risk beliefs, protective behavior, and other dependent variables. Further work is needed to examine these influences for more realistic maps and representative study samples.     

The Significance of Socioeconomic and Ethnic Diversity for the Risk Communication Process

Risk communication is being characterized as one way of facilitating more effective, democratic and participatory risk management strategies. An emphasis on formal communication approaches as a means to improve decisions and decrease conflict will highlight the challenge of managing hazards within a culturally heterogeneous society. Communication and participatory strategies will be considered successful only if diverse communities can be engaged as partners in the policy process. Because responses to risks are embedded and evolve within broader social environments, achieving the promise of risk communication across a diverse society may not be possible absent an understanding of how sociocultural variables and past experiences shape the exchange of ideas or information in any particular situation. This paper considers the implications of ethnic and socioeconomic variability for the risk communication process, summarizing theoretical perspectives and empirical evidence on the link between sociocultural features and risk responses. Specifically, the factors that define the context of communication may influence: the initial framing of a risk issue, particularly, the adoption of an environmental justice vs. scientific/economic perspective; the perceived importance of various aspects of the decision problem; and prior beliefs about environmental hazards and agencies involved in risk management. Two examples of situations requiring communications about risk are presented and illustrate how these principles could operate in minority or lower-income communities. A significant challenge for health and regulatory officials will be to engage in an interactive process of information and opinion exchanges that is reasonable and effective within vastly different socioeconomic and cultural contexts.     

Methodological Approaches to Assessing Risk Perceptions Associated with Food-Related Hazards

The psychometric approach developed by Slovic and his co-workers has been effectively used to assess risk perceptions associated with different food-related hazards. However, further examination (using questionnaire data and partial correlation techniques) has indicated that technological hazards are highly differentiated from lifestyle hazards, in terms of both hazard control and knowledge about the hazard. Optimistic bias was also seen to vary between hazards. Further research has focused on a particular hazard, genetic engineering. Risk perceptions associated with genetic engineering are underpinned by ethical concern and questions relating to perceived need for the technology, as well as perceptions of risk or harm. However, increasing the specificity of hazard stimuli was found to alter the factor structure of underlying risk perceptions. The utility of preference mapping procedures in determining individual differences in trust in risk regulators is also discussed.     

Factors in Risk Perception

Risk perception is a phenomenon in search of an explanation. Several approaches are discussed in this paper. Technical risk estimates are sometimes a potent factor in accounting for perceived risk, but in many important applications it is not. Heuristics and biases, mainly availability, account for only a minor portion of risk perception, and media contents have not been clearly implicated in risk perception. The psychometric model is probably the leading contender in the field, but its explanatory value is only around 20% of the variance of raw data. Adding a factor of "unnatural risk" considerably improves the psychometric model. Cultural Theory, on the other hand, has not been able to explain more than 5–10% of the variance of perceived risk, and other value scales have similarly failed. A model is proposed in which attitude, risk sensitivity, and specific fear are used as explanatory variables; this model seems to explain well over 30–40% of the variance and is thus more promising than previous approaches. The model offers a different type of psychological explanation of risk perception, and it has many implications, e.g., a different approach to the relationship between attitude and perceived risk, as compared with the usual cognitive analysis of attitude.     

Knowledge,Risk Perceptions,and Xenophobic Attitudes: Evidence from Italy During the Ebola Outbreak

The purposes of the current study were twofold: (1) to investigate affective and cognitive responses and social‐contextual factors related to Ebola and their intercorrelations in a developed country without widespread Ebola transmission; and (2) to examine the relationships among risk perception of Ebola, levels of knowledge about Ebola, and (blatant and subtle) prejudice toward African immigrants. Between January 2015 and March 2015, an anonymous cross‐sectional survey was conducted among a convenience sample of 486 Italian adults. Results showed that most participants were not particularly concerned about Ebola and did not feel at risk of acquiring the virus. Cognitive dimensions of risk perception of Ebola (i.e., perceived severity of illness, perceived personal impact, perceived coping efficacy, and likelihood of infection), affective response (or worry) to Ebola, and social‐contextual factors (i.e., perceived preparedness of institutions, family members’ and friends’ levels of worry) were interrelated. Prejudice toward African immigrants was positively related to risk perception of Ebola and negatively related to levels of knowledge about Ebola even when controlling for sociodemographic variables including political preference.     

Out of Sight,Out of Mind? Geographic and Social Predictors of Flood Risk Awareness

The persistent gap in flood risk awareness in Canada, and elsewhere in North America, is a continual source of worry for researchers and emergency managers; many people living in at‐risk places are simply unaware of risks and of their proximity to hazards. This study seeks to understand which residents were aware of flood risk, using unique representative survey data of Calgary residents living in the city's flood‐prone neighborhoods collected after the devastating and costly 2013 Southern Alberta Flood. The article uses logistic regression models to analyze which residents were aware of risk to their homes. Findings indicate that, in addition to various demographic predictors, many of the geographic predictors (including the elevation of one's home relative to the river) are significant predictors of awareness. Having a direct sight line to one of Calgary's two rivers is also a significant predictor in some of the models, suggesting that the visibility of hazards matters for flood risk perception, although this effect fades when many of the geographic predictors are added. Finally, the models indicate that several variables related to local, neighborhood‐based social networks are significant as well. These findings reveal that both physical surroundings and social context are important for understanding risk awareness. The article concludes by discussing the relevance for social science research on disasters and hazards, as well as for planners and emergency managers.