Risk Analysis: Celebrating the Accomplishments and Embracing Ongoing Challenges

As part of the celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Society for Risk Analysis and Risk Analysis: An International Journal, this essay reviews the 10 most important accomplishments of risk analysis from 1980 to 2010, outlines major accomplishments in three major categories from 2011 to 2019, discusses how editors circulate authors’ accomplishments, and proposes 10 major risk-related challenges for 2020–2030. Authors conclude that the next decade will severely test the field of risk analysis.     

Mobile communication and refugees: An analytical review of academic literature

Over the past decade, an expanding literature has explored the ways in which refugees rely on mobile communication technologies to stay in touch with a wider community and to access relevant information and services in their new places. Nevertheless, challenges linked to (a lack of) digital literacy and accessibility among refugees, and associated risks of technology use can negatively affect their empowerment and participation in a “mediatized” society. In light of the mutually shaping processes emerging between technology and society, this article provides an overview of studies focusing on the relationship between mobile communication practices and refugee lives under different circumstances. Using the concept of affordances as an analytic tool, this article looks into ways in which existing studies address the possibilities and vulnerabilities of mobile communications, the social conditions, and the agency of refugees in engaging with mobile technologies in the different temporal and spatial dimensions of their migration trajectories. Future studies should explore more collective processes and the power dynamics involved in the appropriation of mobile technologies by different migration actors.     

Similarities and Dissimilarities in Spouses’ Narratives of Miscarriage: A Dyadic Analysis of Communicated Narrative Sense-Making and Well-Being

Drawing upon communicated narrative sense-making (CNSM) theory, we explored how husbands and wives narratively make sense of their miscarriage and links to well-being. Specifically, we analyzed how the narrative theme, sequence, and similarity related to spouses’ perceived stress and relational satisfaction. Heterosexual married couples (n = 185; N = 370) who had experienced a miscarriage responded to online questionnaires in which they told the story of their pregnancy loss and completed measures of well-being. Seven miscarriage story themes emerged – hope lost, factual, time heals, helpful support, unhelpful support, cautiously optimistic, and guilt/shame. Findings demonstrated that husbands’ themes accounted for differences in their relational satisfaction, whereas wives’ themes accounted for differences in their perceived stress. Analyses on narrative similarity revealed couples with different themes reported higher relational satisfaction than those with similar themes. Further, those couples with the same narrative sequences (i.e., contaminated, redemptive, or ambivalent) reported less perceived stress than those with different narrative sequences. These findings suggest that storying miscarriage helps both husbands and wives process loss in unique ways.     

Examples of the use of an equivalence theorem in constructing optimum experimental designs for random-effects nonlinear regression models

The problem considered is that of finding an optimum measurement schedule to estimate population parameters in a nonlinear model when the patient effects are random. The paper presents examples of the use of sensitivity functions, derived from the General Equivalence Theorem for D-optimality, in the construction of optimum population designs for such schedules. With independent observations, the theorem applies to the potential inclusion of a single observation. However, in population designs the observations are correlated and the theorem applies to the inclusion of an additional measurement schedule. In one example, three groups of patients of differing size are subject to distinct schedules. Numerical, as opposed to analytical, calculation of the sensitivity function is advocated. The required covariances of the observations are found by simulation.     

Work accommodation for people with multiple chemical sensitivity

Multiple chemical sensitivity (MCS) is a term used to describe allergic-like reactions to chemicals that represent everyday exposures in industrialized countries. It is sometimes associated with electromagnetic sensitivity, and both conditions are most likely engendered by environmental exposures. Prevalence studies suggest that chemical sensitivity affects 12-15% of the US population and that it crosses age, socio-economic status and racial lines. Electromagnetic sensitivity is less understood, but affects a portion of those with chemical sensitivity. Persons with these environmental sensitivities often experience difficulties with health care, housing and work. Workplace barriers result in significant disability, with ensuing financial loss and isolation for the worker. We examined work accommodations for 100 persons with self-reported MCS and its relation to life satisfaction. Results are discussed in terms of accommodating invisible disabilities that challenge industrial capitalism.     

Quantifying uncertainty in the biospheric carbon flux for England and Wales

Summary.  A crucial issue in the current global warming debate is the effect of vegetation and soils on carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentrations in the atmosphere. Vegetation can extract CO₂ through photosynthesis, but respiration, decay of soil organic matter and disturbance effects such as fire return it to the atmosphere. The balance of these processes is the net carbon flux. To estimate the biospheric carbon flux for England and Wales, we address the statistical problem of inference for the sum of multiple outputs from a complex deterministic computer code whose input parameters are uncertain. The code is a process model which simulates the carbon dynamics of vegetation and soils, including the amount of carbon that is stored as a result of photosynthesis and the amount that is returned to the atmosphere through respiration. The aggregation of outputs corresponding to multiple sites and types of vegetation in a region gives an estimate of the total carbon flux for that region over a period of time. Expert prior opinions are elicited for marginal uncertainty about the relevant input parameters and for correlations of inputs between sites. A Gaussian process model is used to build emulators of the multiple code outputs and Bayesian uncertainty analysis is then used to propagate uncertainty in the input parameters through to uncertainty on the aggregated output. Numerical results are presented for England and Wales in the year 2000. It is estimated that vegetation and soils in England and Wales constituted a net sink of 7.55 Mt C (1 Mt C = 10¹² g of carbon) in 2000, with standard deviation 0.56 Mt C resulting from the sources of uncertainty that are considered.     

Managing cross‐border cooperation between voluntary organizations in Ireland

The voluntary nonprofit sector in Ireland has grown significantly in recent years. A related trend has been the growth of cross‐border (in effect, transnational) cooperation between voluntary organizations based in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. However, this development has posed a set of management issues in terms of structure, forms of governance and decision making, day‐to‐day project management, and sustainability. Cross‐border work has also meant that voluntary bodies confront a distinctive set of barriers in relation to political and ethnic conflict, social and cultural attitudes, and practical delivery. Strengthening of cooperation across borders will require greater planning, mainstream funding, focused management, diversification of services, and realistic expectations.     

Diagnostics for dependence within time series extremes

Summary. The analysis of extreme values within a stationary time series entails various assumptions concerning its long- and short-range dependence. We present a range of new diagnostic tools for assessing whether these assumptions are appropriate and for identifying structure within extreme events. These tools are based on tail characteristics of joint survivor functions but can be implemented by using existing estimation methods for extremes of univariate independent and identically distributed variables. Our diagnostic aids are illustrated through theoretical examples, simulation studies and by application to rainfall and exchange rate data. On the basis of these diagnostics we can explain characteristics that are found in the observed extreme events of these series and also gain insight into the properties of events that are more extreme than those observed.     

LENGTH-BIASING, CHARACTERIZATIONS OF LAWS AND THE MOMENT PROBLEM

A positive random variable X with a finite mean has an induced length-biased law represented by Y, and Y is stochastically larger than X. An independent uniform random contraction of Y, UY, has the same law as X if and only if the latter is exponential. This property is extended to non-uniform contractions and a more general notion of length-biasing. The distributional equality of X and W leads to a functional equation for the moment function of X, which has either Infinitely many solutions or none. When U is constant, X can have a log-normal law, but it can also have laws with the same moment sequence as this log-nod law. The case where U has a certain beta, or generalized beta, law give t3 characterizations of generalized gamma laws, or to products of independent copies of them. This occurs even when these laws are not determined by their moment sequences.     

People and their waste in an emergency context: The case of Monrovia, Liberia

Liberia has gone through civil crisis for over a decade which has resulted in the destruction of infrastructure and disruption of basic services delivery particularly in Monrovia, the capital city. Most of the 1.3 million people living in Monrovia are without adequate environmental sanitation and waste management services which situation poses a serious health risk to the residents. The current waste management service coverage is less than 20% and disposal is by indiscriminate open dumping. In 2003, there were series of outbreaks of cholera epidemics in the city during which time a total of 26,651 cases were reported with many dying.The waste management plan was initiated as an exit strategy of UNICEF following an intervention response programme to assist the Monrovia City Corporation (MCC) whose capacity in this area had been crippled as a result of years of war, through the provision of support in solid waste collection and disposal.The objectives of the plan were to:

(a) Improve waste management services delivery in the city.

(b) Strengthen the ability of the MCC to plan and manage the waste services delivery.

(c) Enhance cooperation of service beneficiaries through comprehensive and effective health education and service promotional campaign.

(d) Enhance revenue generation and community participation through the promotion of private sector and CBOs/NGOs active involvement in the waste management service delivery.

The general methodology adopted for the assignment entailed the following:Desk study and review of existing reports on Water and Environmental Sanitation (WES) in Monrovia and other relevant literature, consultation with stakeholders, site visits and participatory planning which aimed at soliciting the opinions of the various stakeholders involved with the respective components to capture their aspirations and experiences. It also covered collection and analysis of available information and data to facilitate the plan preparation and facilities design.The three-phased strategy (short, medium and long term) covering a period of 10 years (August 2004–December 2014), recommended a combination of technical options for collection based on the pursuit of staged development to allow for the adoption of realistically attainable standards within a framework of continuous and systematic improvements as economic conditions improved and new knowledge gained through practice. The plan sought to blend the capacity within the City Corporation with that of the private sector and NGOs/CBOs to respond to the diverse service demands of the city taking into consideration housing and infrastructural conditions, service costs and cost recovery to ensure sustainability. It also identified sources of financing and allocated financing responsibilities to facilitate effective plan implementation.