Breaking Down Uncertain Risks for Risk Communication: A Conceptual Review of the Environmental Health Literature

Abstract

In this conceptual review, we describe how the concept of "uncertain risk" is addressed in thePALABRAS CLAVES: comunicació n de riesgos, gestió n de riesgos, incertidumbre

Appropriate Governance Responses to Infectious Disease Threats: Developing Working Hypotheses

“…In our context this means that there is not necessary a one-to-one relationship between a type of crisis and a type of response, but that the same types of collaborative response can be effective for different types of crisis and vice versa. The crisis typology developed by The International Risk Governance Council (IRGC, 2008; an updated version published by Florin & Bürkler (2017), on the contrary, is more concerned with keeping types of risk issues presented (simple, uncertain, complex, and/or ambiguous) separate from the description of possible designs for risk management strategies ("risk-informed," "robustness-focused", "precaution-based," "resilience-focused," and "discourse-based" strategies) (Jansen, Claassen, van Poll, van Kamp, & Timmermans, 2018). This typology has, however, two other disadvantages in the light of our line of argument.…”

Understanding of the concept of ‘uncertain risk’. A qualitative study among different societal groups

“…Within the studied sample, the aspects used to describe their understanding of the concept of 'uncertain risk' varied within and between groups. Some individuals described multiple epistemic uncertainties found in Jansen et al (2017), while others (including experts) described only one. Additionally many different associations were found in the participants' descriptions of the concept of 'uncertain risk' (Appendix A).…”

“…Tosun (2013) defines uncertain risks as '[ … ] situations in which the relationship between activities and their potential hazard cannot be established'. In order to further clarify the scientific meaning of the concept 'uncertain risk' we conducted a conceptual review of the environmental health literature (Jansen et al 2017) and tried to answer about what aspects of risk uncertainty exists (location of uncertainty) when scientists refer to 'uncertain risk'. The review showed that the uncertainty about the presence or existence of risk may be the result of six different epistemic uncertainties (Figure 1).…”

“…For example, communicating uncertainty about the intrinsic properties of an agent (1), for example in newly engineered nanomaterials, implies a high level of uncertainty because there also is uncertainty about nature of effects (2) and the nature of the hazard (3). In contrast, uncertainty about the nature of the hazard, for example in chemicals with unclear toxicity, implies a lower level of uncertainty because there has to be sufficient evidence for an agent's hazardous intrinsic properties and a certain effect must be associated (Jansen et al 2017). These differences are not clear in the concept of uncertain risk, in verbal presentations of uncertain risks, such as 'a risk cannot be excluded' or 'there possibly is a risk', or in numerical expressions of probabilistic risk.…”

Principalism in public health decision making in the context of the COVID‐19 pandemic

“…Furthermore, "(un)intended misinterpretation of uncertainty is large", which makes risk communication in case of uncertain risks challenging and often used as a strategy toward influencing public health policies, either to reject or to demand policy action. 4 Indeed, despite this lack of research and scientific consensus around COVID-19, political and institutional speech has reflected a relative certainty about the disease, its evolution and the measures taken. 5 This contrasts with the acknowledgment that "no previous training, no prior strategic planning knowledge, no prior operational experience, and no former decision-making skillset has prepared anyone for the uncertainty surrounding what this complex new reality presents us with."…”