To many developers of technologies that affect public health or the environment, "risk communication" means persuading the public that the potential risks of such technologies are small and should be ignored. █████ ███ ███████████ █████ ██ ████ ███ ████ ██ ███████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ██████████ ███ ██████ ██████ ██ █████████████ █████ ███ ████ ███ ████ ███████ █████████ █████ ████████ ██████ ██████████ ██████ ███████ ███████ ████ ████ ███████████ ███████ ████ ███ █████ █████ ██████ ███████ ████ ████ ██████ ██████ ██ █████ ██ ███████ ███████ ████ ████ █████████████ ████ ████ ██████████ ███████ ████ ███ ██████ ███ █████ ██████████████ ██ █ █████████ ███ ████████████ ████ ██ ████████
Intro topic ·Risk communication
People who communicate risks to the public think lay people often ignore mundane dangers, but fear exotic dangers that are highly unlikely to materialize.
Lay people's assessment of risk ·Generally accurate, when not considering ethical matters
Lay people provide reasonably accurate ranks of hazards by annual number of deaths. A study showed that they can understand specific risks of electromagnetic fields.
Example supporting author ·Recent study showed effectiveness of risk-communication based on understanding the public
Brochure on risks of radon was developed based on interviews and questionnaires of the public. People who read this brochure understood the risks of radon better than people who had read a different brochure that didn't involve interviews or questionnaires of the public.
Passage Style
Critique or debate
Problem-analysis
3.
According to the passage, it ██ ████████ ████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ████ █████ ████ ████ █████████████ ███████ ██ ███████████ ████ ███ ██████ ███ ████ ████████ █████ █████ █ ██████████ ███████████
Question Type
Implied
The author makes this prediction in P3: if people have erroneous beliefs about a technology, they will probably misconstrue the risk communicators’ messages.
Unsupported. The lay people won’t recognize their errors or change their minds—they’ll just misunderstand what the risk communicators are trying to say.
b
The lay people ████ ████ █████████ ██████ █████ █████ ██ ███ █████ ██ ███ ███ ████████████
Unsupported. The lay people won’t recognize their errors or change their minds—they’ll just misunderstand what the risk communicators are trying to say.
This paraphrases the author’s prediction. She adopts the principle that people fit new information into the framework of their existing beliefs. And f those beliefs are mistaken, people will misinterpret what the risk communicators were trying to say.
Starts off right, but takes it too far. The lay people will misunderstand the new information. But the prediction ends there. The author doesn’t suggest that lay people ever distort information.
e
The lay people ████ ██████ ███ █████████████ █████ █ ██████████ ████ ████████ ███████████ ██████████
The author does raise concerns that lay people might sometimes ignore risk communicators’ messages, but she never suggests that they specifically do this with any communication about a technology they consider dangerous, or that they do this whenever they have mistaken ideas about that technology.
Difficulty
88% of people who answer get this correct
This is a moderately difficult question.
It is slightly harder than the average question in this passage.
CURVE
Score of students with a 50% chance of getting this right
25%128
142
75%155
Analysis
Implied
Critique or debate
Humanities
Problem-analysis
Answer Popularity
PopularityAvg. score
a
4%
162
b
2%
165
c
88%
168
d
5%
162
e
1%
160
Question history
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