PT101.S1.P1.Q5 > Analytics

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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.

Author's perspective · Need clear understanding about how public perceives risk

Lay people's definition of risk · Involves subject ethical concerns

Example: small risk to children is more important than large risk to consenting adults.

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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.

Author's perspective · Risk communicators should understand what their audience knows and believes about risk

This will increase the chance that risk communicators' message is understood accurately.

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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

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Question Type

Implied

This one is hard to predict, but recall the author’s overall position: the goal of risk communication should be to educate people, and in order to do so effectively, risk communicators should understand what their audience already knows and believes about a given risk. Meanwhile, the risk communicators in the first paragraph believe that their job is to persuade people that technological risks are small and should be ignored. The right answer will be supported in the passage as something that the author would be more likely to emphasize than the risk communicators would.

lay people's tendency ██ ██████ ███████ █████ ████████████ ████ ████ ████ ███ ██ ███████

Anti-supported. This is something that the risk communicators would be more likely to emphasize, not the author. The risk communicators claim that lay people get upset about exotic (i.e., new or strange) technologies. The author challenges the support for that claim, calling into question whether lay people really do have this tendency.

lay people's tendency ██ ███████ █████ ████ ███████ █████ ███ ████████ ██████████

Unsupported. Neither the author nor the risk communicators offer any stance on whether lay people have this tendency. The author just notes that certain studies have asked lay people to make difficult comparisons between risks. There’s no indication that this is a general tendency among lay people.

the need for ███ ██████ ██ █████ ███████████ ██████ █████ █████████████ ████

Anti-supported. The author argues against the idea that lay people need to simply adopt the advice of others; she wants them to be able to make their own informed decisions and points out that lay people already “have substantial knowledge about many risks.” Meanwhile, the risk communicators in P1 think lay people are bad at gauging risk, and see their job as persuading people to relax and adopt the advice of others. So the author would be less likely to emphasize (C) than the risk communicators.

the inability of ███ ██████ ██ ████ ███████ ██ ███ ██████ ██ ██████████ ██████ ████████

Anti-supported. The author wouldn’t emphasize this; she disagrees that it’s true. She says lay people are, in fact, able to accurately rank hazards this way. Meanwhile, the risk communicators in P1 think that lay people are bad at accurately gauging risks. So the author would be less likely to emphasize (D) than the risk communicators.

the impact of ███ ████████ █████ ███████ ██ █████ ███████████ ██ ████

Strongly supported. The author argues that this is a key factor that risk communicators should understand and account for when communicating risks. Meanwhile, the risk communicators in P1 think that lay people’s risk perception is based on whether the risk is mundane or exotic—there’s no sign that they think risk perception is also affected by people’s values. So the author would be more likely to emphasize (E) than the risk communicators would.

PrepTest 101 - Section 1 - Passage 1 - Question 5

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