Johnson Branden B
Bureau of Risk Analysis, Division of Science, Research and Technology, New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Trenton, NJ 08625-0409, USA.
Risk Anal. 2004 Feb;24(1):131-45. doi: 10.1111/j.0272-4332.2004.00417.x.
Despite many claims for and against the use of risk comparisons in risk communication, few empirical studies have explored their effect. Even fewer have examined the public's relative preferences among different kinds of risk comparisons. Two studies, published in this journal in 1990 and 2003, used seven measures of "acceptability" to examine public reaction to 14 examples of risk comparisons, as used by a hypothetical factory manager to explain risks of his ethylene oxide plant. This study examined the effect on preferences of scenarios involving low or high conflict between the factory manager and residents of the hypothetical town (as had the 2003 study), and inclusion of a claim that the comparison demonstrated the risks' acceptability. It also tested the Finucane et al. (2000) affect hypothesis that information emphasizing low risks-as in these risk comparisons-would raise benefits estimates without changing risk estimates. Using similar but revised scenarios, risk comparison examples (10 instead of 14), and evaluation measures, an opportunity sample of 303 New Jersey residents rated the comparisons, and the risks and benefits of the factory. On average, all comparisons received positive ratings on all evaluation measures in all conditions. Direct and indirect measures showed that the conflict manipulation worked; overall, No-Conflict and Conflict scenarios evoked scores that were not significantly different. The attachment to each risk comparison of a risk acceptability claim ("So our factory's risks should be acceptable to you.") did not worsen ratings relative to conditions lacking this claim. Readers who did or did not see this claim were equally likely to infer an attempt to persuade them to accept the risk from the comparison. As in the 2003 article, there was great individual variability in inferred rankings of the risk comparisons. However, exposure to the risk comparisons did not reduce risk estimates significantly (while raising benefit estimates), and Conflict-Claim respondents found the risk of the hypothetical factory less acceptable than No-Conflict respondents. Results suggest that neither risk comparisons nor risk acceptability claims are automatically anathema to audiences, but they may have tiny or unintended effects on audience judgments about risky situations.
尽管对于在风险沟通中使用风险比较存在诸多支持和反对的观点，但很少有实证研究探讨其效果。更少有人研究公众在不同类型风险比较中的相对偏好。1990年和2003年发表在本期刊上的两项研究，使用了七种“可接受性”指标来考察公众对14个风险比较示例的反应，这些示例由一位假设的工厂经理用来解释其环氧乙烷工厂的风险。本研究考察了涉及工厂经理与假设城镇居民之间低冲突或高冲突的情景（如2003年的研究）以及包含风险比较表明风险可接受性这一说法对偏好的影响。它还检验了菲纽凯恩等人（2000年）的情感假设，即如这些风险比较中强调低风险的信息会在不改变风险估计的情况下提高收益估计。使用类似但经过修订的情景、风险比较示例（10个而非14个）以及评估指标，对303名新泽西居民的机会样本进行了风险比较、工厂风险和收益的评级。平均而言，在所有条件下，所有比较在所有评估指标上都获得了正面评级。直接和间接指标表明冲突操纵起作用了；总体而言，无冲突情景和冲突情景引发的分数没有显著差异。相对于缺乏这一说法的情况，对每个风险比较附加风险可接受性声明（“所以我们工厂的风险应该是你们可以接受的。”）并没有使评级变差。看到或没看到这一说法的读者同样有可能从比较中推断出试图说服他们接受风险的意图。与2003年的文章一样，在风险比较的推断排名中存在很大的个体差异。然而，接触风险比较并没有显著降低风险估计（同时提高了收益估计），并且冲突声明组的受访者认为假设工厂的风险比无冲突组的受访者更不可接受。结果表明，风险比较和风险可接受性声明都不会自动引起受众反感，但它们可能对受众对风险情况的判断产生微小或意想不到的影响。
