Another Person’s Peril: Peanut Allergy, Risk Perceptions, and Responsible Sociality

Abstract

This article examines perceptions of health risk when some individuals within a shared space are in heightened danger but anyone, including unaffected others, can be a vector of risk. Using the case of peanut allergy and drawing on qualitative content analysis of the public comments submitted in response to an unsuccessful 2010 U.S. Department of Transportation proposal to prohibit peanuts on airplanes, we analyze contention over the boundaries of responsibility for mitigating exposure to risk. We find three key dimensions of proximity to risk (material, social, and situational) characterizing ardent claims both for and against policy enactment. These proximity concerns underlay commenters’ sensemaking about fear, trust, rights, moral obligations, and liberty in the act of sharing space with others, while allowing them to stake positions on what we call “responsible sociality”—an ethic of discernible empathy for proximate others and of consideration for public benefit in social and communal settings. We conclude by discussing the insights our case affords several other areas of scholarship attentive to the intractable yet timely question of “for whom do we care?”

Relational Risk: How Relationships Shape Personal Assessments of Risk and Mitigation

“…Recent work highlights the importance of relational interactions for the management of risks to well-being (Brownlie and Howson 2005; Reich 2020), such as in the case of reducing peanut allergen exposure. DeSoucey and Waggoner (2022:52) demonstrate how mitigating risk cannot rely solely on the individual precautions of vulnerable people, but instead requires the interpersonal efforts of unknown others, whereby the “generalized trust of proximate strangers” facilitates collective risk perception and abatement.…”

“…Sociologists have highlighted sociocultural context and relational factors as important for how actors behave in the face of uncertainty (Douglas and Wildavsky 1983; Lupton 1999). From immigrants making decisions about the risk of crossing a dangerous border (Kandel and Massey 2002; Ryo 2013) to community members determining whether a nearby polluting factory has increased environmental toxicity (Auyero and Swistun 2008), to organizations assessing financial risk mitigation strategies (Vasi and King 2012), or parents noting the public health risks posed by allergens in their children’s school (DeSoucey and Waggoner 2022), these studies demonstrate that having access to mitigation tools is not sufficient for its uptake, nor does having information about risk-reduction always translate directly into proactive behavior among the vulnerable, or to the vulnerable seeing themselves as vulnerable.…”

Historical and social science perspectives on food allergy

“…Peanut allergy, for example, has been described by DeSoucey and Waggoner as existing ‘in the interstices of scientific facts, commercial interests, and shifting cultural tenets’. In turn, the risk posed by peanuts ‘is a rich manifestation of disputes over the boundaries of responsibility for health and safety for self and others’ 53 . Moreover, Cook has argued that allergic individuals do not perceive these risks on their own 54 .…”

“…In turn, the risk posed by peanuts 'is a rich manifestation of disputes over the boundaries of responsibility for health and safety for self and others'. 53 Moreover, Cook has argued that allergic individuals do not perceive these risks on their own. 54 Instead, their perception is entangled in their response to particular physical and social environments, including the influence of other people.…”

Risk Governance in the Early Pandemic: Governance Roles and Coleman’s Taxonomy of Social Actors

“…For instance, one recent contribution to the work around risk governance stresses the divide between different ethics of risk and harm mitigation from the standpoint of the individual. In the context of regulating food allergies in shared social spaces—namely passenger planes in the United States—diametrically opposed perceptions of risk governance come into play ( DeSoucey & Waggoner, 2022 ). In this setting, some individuals see the mitigation of risk around food allergies on planes through the lens of a hyper-individualistic understanding of personal responsibility, while others view personal responsibility through a decidedly relational and collectivistic lens.…”